Dude's gonna miss their next Super Bowl appearance, imoDeath Row killer's last words: Go Raiders
MICHAEL KIEFER AND JUDI VILLA
THE ARIZONA REPUBLIC
Posted: 5/23/2007
Comer was executed Tuesday in Florence, Ariz. Comer was convicted in a 1987 crime spree in which he killed a fellow camper at Apache Lake east of Phoenix. He also was convicted of repeatedly raping a female camper the same night, once in front of her boyfriend.
FLORENCE, Ariz. -- Robert Comer died Tuesday with a steady gaze and a defiant smile on his face, the first person to be executed in Arizona since November 2000.
He was strapped to a gurney and covered up to his neck with a sheet.
There was no sight of the catheter into his groin that made the lethal injection possible, no sight of the executioners on the other side of a wall.
But Comer was smiling; he had petitioned the federal courts to stop his appeals and hasten his own execution. He was in control of his destiny.
Comer brought a picture of his daughter with him to the death chamber and used his last words to say, "Go, Raiders."
Then, the chemicals coursed through his veins - first Sodium Pentathol to render him unconscious, then pancuronium bromide to stop his breathing and paralyze him, then potassium chloride to stop his heart - and he held that smile until he slipped away.
Arizona is gearing up to resume executions after a nearly seven-year hiatus. Another Arizona death-row inmate recently lost his last appeal. A third may be extradited from West Virginia.
But as Arizona lapsed in executions, lethal injection, its preferred method, has come under scrutiny as possibly cruel and inhumane.
In fact, a last-minute motion for reprieve filed on Comer's behalf by a Tucson capital-punishment watchdog group raised the risk of extreme suffering as grounds for a stay of execution.
The Arizona Supreme Court refused to consider the motion.
Of the 37 states that use lethal injection as a means of execution, more than a dozen have either granted stays or have completely halted executions because of legal or ethical challenges.
The Arizona Department of Corrections does not reveal the exact prescriptions and protocols of its lethal-injection procedures.
"Because of the lack of standards provided for in the statute, the lethal-injection process subjects condemned prisoners to significant and utterly unnecessary risks that they will be tortured to death," said public defender Victoria Washington, who, to no avail, has filed motions about the potential cruelty of lethal injection.
Comer, who was sentenced to death for fatally shooting a man in 1987, appeared to die peacefully.
State moratoriums
But anti-lethal-injection lobbyists say the paralyzing drug may prevent the condemned person from showing pain or discomfort. That drug and the fatal drug that stops the heart are said to be extremely painful when administered without adequate sedation.
"You don't know what he's feeling when pancuronium bromide is involved," said Lisa McCalmont, a former assistant federal public defender in Oklahoma. McCalmont is considered an expert on lethal injection.
"It masks the viewer's ability to see what pain Mr. Comer is experiencing," she said. "An execution can look peaceful and not be peaceful for him."
Though it may be another strategy to stop the death penalty, disputes over lethal injection have spread.
Last year, New Jersey became the first jurisdiction to enact a moratorium on executions through legislation and appointed a study commission to review its capital-punishment system.
In June, the District Court for the Western District of Missouri ordered that all executions be put on hold until the Department of Corrections adjusts the execution procedures.
Not enough doctors
Meanwhile in California, the state could not find enough doctors willing to perform executions. Doctors there said executing inmates would violate the Hippocratic oath.
The state has proposed a lethal-injection protocol that would involve using the same three drugs but would not require the use of doctors in carrying out executions.
The new protocol would increase training to prevent erroneously mixing the drug cocktail. The state has also altered the dosage of the drugs.
A federal judge in California ruled in December that the state's current method of lethal injection was at risk of violating the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. The judge said California's "implementation of lethal injection is broken, but it can be fixed."
The state is in the process of updating its lethal-injection protocol.
Florida Gov. Jeb Bush declared a moratorium in December after the botched execution of an inmate. The drugs had to be administered a second time, and it took the inmate 34 minutes to die.
Dale Baich, a federal public defender in Phoenix, said, "We have reviewed the state's 2004 execution manual (the last one available) and requested the updates. After further consultation with our experts, we will soon decide whether to challenge the Arizona lethal-injection protocol."
Comer's execution lasted nine minutes from start to finish.
Arguing the sides
As he was dying, 17 protesters gathered about two miles from the Florence prison to object to Comer's execution. The protest was kept on prison land and could not be seen by passers-by.
"Taking a person's life does not bring a person back," protester Dan Wolford said.
"His taking a life doesn't justify taking his. He doesn't forfeit his right to live because he took someone else's life."
Regardless of the outcome of the debate about whether lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment, Wolford said, he is vehemently against the death penalty and believes there are other alternatives to protect society.
"If you take an eye for an eye, it just makes both people blind," Wolford said.
About a mile down the road, George Williams of Mesa was the sole supporter of the death penalty. Williams held a sign bearing the names of Comer's victims.
Williams said execution is the only way to guarantee that a killer won't escape.
"This man can never do it again," he said. "He can never kill again."
Errr- I wonder who inherited his spiked shoulder pads
