Joseph Wood's execution date came Wednesday, and his planned death didn't really go smoothly and quickly like how authorities intended it to be. Was Wood's execution too inhumane?
According to the lawyers of the double murderer, on Joseph Wood's execution date, the deed took nearly two hours to finish and he was seen gasping and snorting for more than an hour before his last breath.
Joseph Wood's execution date which was scheduled on Wednesday, July 23, caused a huge stir among Arizona citizens when it was revealed that the death penalty was carried out with a two-drug combination - something the state authorities have never tried before.
Because of the controversy over John Wood's execution, a debate on how U.S. states should carry out the death penalty is brewing from all directions.
According to MSNBC, defense attorneys have asked the judge to stop Joseph Wood's execution midway because they noticed that the process was unbearable and pretty painful to watch. They even ordered prison officials to resuscitate Wood, but the court acted rather late and the inmate was pronounced dead after several minutes of living torture.
"The execution commenced at 1:52 p.m. at the Arizona State Prison Complex (ASPC) - Florence. He was pronounced dead at 3:49 p.m," Arizona Attorney General Tom Horne said in a statement.
Details on what really took place on Joseph Wood's execution date were not released thus far, and the problems the execution team faced were left concealed from the public.
"He has been gasping and snorting for more than an hour," lawyers noted in their request for an emergency stay of execution.
Joseph Wood was condemned to die because he killed his girlfriend and his girlfriend's father in 1989.
Earlier reports mentioned that the late embattled inmate had challenged the execution on the grounds stating that Arizona was violating the First Amendment by not revealing the source of the lethal-injection that was to be used on Joseph Wood's execution date.
Although an appeals panel had agreed with Wood, the U.S. Supreme Court lifted the stay of execution. Because of this the Arizona Supreme Court shortly delayed the execution on Wednesday but ultimately gave the execution team the green light.
The 55-year-old inmate was reportedly killed by death penalty using a combination of midazolam and hydromorphone - the same drugs used in a recent Ohio execution, where the inmate also struggled for a couple of minutes before exhaling his last breath.
Joseph Wood's execution date had been put on hold for a couple of times before because of last-minute appeals. One of which claimed that the guillotine would be better than lethal injections, reported NBC News.
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