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Irish Daily Mirror
2 days ago
- General
- Irish Daily Mirror
Death row survivor alerted emergency services to fire that killed her, says pal
Florida death row survivor Sonia 'Sunny' Jacobs - who died in a house fire along with her carer - was the one who alerted emergency services to the fire but they were both overcome by smoke, her pal has revealed. 'Sunny' (76) and her carer Kevin Kelly, from Galway, died in the house fire which broke out in the bungalow in Gleann Mac Muirinn in Connemara in the early hours of Tuesday morning. 'Sunny', who was originally from New York, and Mr Kelly died after they were overcome by smoke, her pal and founder of Death Penalty Action, Abraham J. Bonowitz has revealed. This comes as an online Gathering for Sunny is being organised in Ireland and America on Sunday, June 8 via Zoom. 'Sunny was aware there was a fire and it was she who called the emergency services,' Mr Bonowitz said on social media. 'Both she and her carer Kevin were overcome by smoke before Kevin could get her out. Neither were burned and I am grateful to know that,' he continued. The online Zoom Gathering will see friends and followers of 'Sunny' light candles, reflect and connect through a short meditation and share some brief words honouring 'Sunny'. 'This will be a simple and gentle gathering in advance of other memorials and celebrations," the organiser stated. Those interested can register at Speaking to The Irish Mirror Mr Bonowitz said 'Sunny was very focused on helping others who also experienced wrongful incarceration. That's why one of the first things I did when I heard she passed away was to donate to her organisation The Sunny Centre. 'We have been friends since we met in 1993. Her passion and life pursuit was to help other survivors of wrongful incarceration and help abolish the death penalty. 'I will miss Sunny deeply. I am grateful for the inspiration provided by her legacy which is love, life and to seek justice for those who have been wronged," said Mr Bonowitz. Gardai and Fire Services were alerted to the fire at around 6.20am on Tuesday. The fire was brought under control by Fire Services and the bodies of Ms Jacobs and Mr Kelly were recovered from inside the house. The scene remained preserved for a technical examination while both bodies were transported to the mortuary at University Hospital Galway for postmortem examinations. 'Sunny' whose husband Peter Pringle, who passed away in 2022 was also a death row survivor and they met in Galway before getting married. Nearly 50 years ago, in 1976, 'Sunny' and her then partner were wrongfully sentenced to death by the Florida courts for the murder of two police men. 'Sunny' was 28 years of age and a mother of two children. In 1993, 17 years later she was exonerated. Her late husband Peter, who died at the age of 84, was also wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death for murdering two gardai in a bank raid in Roscommon in 1980. He had served 15 years in jail before he was released in 1995 after his convictions were deemed unsafe and quashed by the Court of Criminal Appeal. 'Sunny' and Peter met in Galway after Sunny travelled there to speak at an Amnesty International event in 1998 and they married in 2012. They lived in Connemara where they established The Sunny Centre to help other death row survivors and those who've been wrongfully convicted. Sunny also wrote a book entitled 'Stolen Time' about her story as an innocent woman condemned to death.
Daily Mail
03-05-2025
- Daily Mail
The execution that haunts prison worker 28 years later: Death row officer had therapy for a decade after horrific mishap filled cells with the smell of 'burning flesh'
A man who was once the head of Florida 's execution programme revealed one death went so horribly wrong that he needed therapy to come to terms with it. Ron McAndrew, now 88, witnessed executions using the electric chair in Florida, but one traumatising death never left him and the botched execution led to the prison ending the use of the electric chair. The former prison warden didn't aspire to be a correctional officer but he had climbed the ladder after being hired in a Miami prison in 1979. McAndrew watched over the execution of three inmates in total, including murderer John Bush who was sentenced to death for his part in the kidnap and murder of 18-year-old Frances Julia Slater. John Mills Jr. was sentenced to the chair for the abduction and murder of Les Lawhon in Wakulla County, Florida, in 1982. However, the execution of Pedro Medina, a Cuban refugee, was something McAndrew claimed he would 'never forget' and was the death that made him stand down from his role. Executed in 1997 for the murder of 52-year-old former school teacher Dorothy James, the circumstances of his execution elevated objections to the use of electrocution as a means of capital punishment. Speaking to The Sun, McAndrew revealed the chair malfunctioned, saying: 'We didn't electrocute this man. We literally burned him to death.' Medina's last words before being executed were 'I am still innocent', before the electric chair known as Old Sparky, malfunctioned, causing flames to shoot out of Medina's head. He said: 'His body was on fire and there was no way I could stop it. I had to let it run its course.' McAndrew revealed he witnessed the flames coming out from the inmate's head, and said there was a horrific smell. Speaking in a Death Penalty Action video, he explained: 'I heard a pop and within a few seconds the smoke and fire came up from under that helmet and in fact it came up into my face. 'The smoke got blacker and blacker and blacker, the electrician who is wearing these big lineman gloves had his hands ready to take the helmet off his head, he looked at me and said "continue?" 'But there was no way we could stop at that point, I said "absolutely continue", the room started filling with smoke, the smoke went upstairs, all the inmates on death row could smell the burning flesh. 'I had it all over my body, I threw my clothes away that day, I couldn't scrub hard enough to get that smell off me... it was a bad day. 'I believe he knew he was being burned to death. This is much less then we should be as Americans, much less.' The electric chair (pictured in Florida State Prison) is still a permitted execution method, but it is not the primary one. While lethal injection is now the standard, inmates on death row can request execution by electrocution Despite Medina's cruel crimes, the executioner claimed he also felt some sympathy for him because of his 'sad story'. His family were poor and Medina and his brothers used to rob food and beg tourists for money. The brother used to put all the money they gathered into a basket at the end of the day and buy bread and cheese to eat. 'That's the day I had to sit down and have a real serious talk with myself about what I was doing,' McAndrew admitted. The horrendous incident resulted in the governor sending McAndrew to Texas to learn more about the lethal injection. After that botched execution, Florida State Prison adopted for the new lethal injection method going forward. However, the former correctional officer vowed to never stand in the 'death room' ever again and he called the secretary of the Florida Department of Corrections and asked to 'get the hell out of there'. McAndrew was transferred to the Central Florida Reception Centre in Orlando. The experience changed his outlook on the death penalty forever, which he called a 'premeditated, ceremonial, political killing'. McAndrew claimed it was a 'horrible joke' to leave a man in a cell for 30-years but then kill him when he's an old man. He claimed that life without parole is the better option because it leaves the possibility of innocence open and the prisoner can 'contribute to society' by working. He insisted governors use capital punishment as political tools for popularity, claiming the number of executions rise during election years. The former correctional officer revealed that he was forced to go to 13 years of therapy following his experiences on death row. He claimed if he could turn back time, he says he would turn down the offer he received to work on death row. The electric chair is still a permitted execution method, but it is not the primary one. While lethal injection is now the standard, inmates on death row can request execution by electrocution.
Yahoo
14-02-2025
- Yahoo
Two death row inmates convicted of murder executed
Feb. 14 (UPI) -- Two men convicted of murder were executed Thursday night, marking the fourth and fifth executions in the United States this year. James Ford, 64, was executed in Florida for the 1997 murders of Greg and Kim Malnory, a couple killed in front of their 22-year-old daughter. Richard Lee Tabler, 46, was executed in Texas for murdering foreign nationals Mohamed-Amine Rahmouni and Haitham Zayed in 2004. Their executions were criticized by death penalty abolitionists. "Neither of these killings will make us any safer than we were before them, they simply caused more destruction and suffering for all involved," Death Penalty Action said on X. "The time to end the death penalty is NOW!" James D. Ford On the day of his execution, Ford awoke at 3:30 a.m. EST, Ted Veerman, director of communications with the Florida Department of Corrections, told reporters in a press conference prior to his execution. During the day, Ford was visited by three family members and had a last meal of steak, mac and cheese, fried okra, sweet potato, pumpkin pie and sweet tea, the official said. His execution began as scheduled at 6 p.m., and he was pronounced dead at 6:19 p.m., according to a statement the Florida Department of Corrections. Ford was was sentenced to death on June 3, 1999, for killing Greg and Kim Malnory on April 6, 1997, on a sod farm in Charlotte County. On the day of the murders, Ford had arranged to go fishing with the Malnorys on the farm. According to court documents, Ford shot Greg Malnory in the head from behind with a .22 caliber rifle. The wounded Greg Malnory then stumbled out into a middle of a field, where Ford hit him at least seven times in the head and face with an axe. Greg Malnory was later found with his throat slit. Court documents state that Ford also raped Kim Malnory and then beat and executed her. Evidence showed Ford stuck the rifle, named "old Betsy," in Kim Malnory's mouth and pulled the trigger. Maranda Malory, the couple's daughter, was found strapped inside her parents' truck with her mother's blood on her clothes but alive. Along with the two counts of first-degree murder, Ford was convicted of sexual battery with a gun and child endangerment. Following the execution, Veerman read a written statement from Maranda Malory. "While I would never wish any of ... this on my worst enemy, the mental and emotional toll that it takes on a person makes you stronger because it doesn't kill you," Maranda Malnory said in the statement read by Veerman. "While I know this will never bring me back to my mom and dad -- I will never get a chance to meet them -- it is giving me peace of mind." Connie Ankney, Gregory Malnory's mother, called Thursday "the day of final justice" and that with Ford's execution they may finally be able to grieve the lost of their loved ones. "I hope he burns in hell," she said. She later criticized Ford's method of execution, saying it's "so easy to get a shot and go to sleep." "He should have gotten the electric chair," she said. "I would have liked to have seen you burn." Richard Lee Tabler Tabler was scheduled for execution by lethal injection at 6 p.m. CST at the Texas Department of Criminal Justice in Huntsville. In his final statement, posted online by his spiritual adviser, Jay Dan Gumm, Tabler expressed regret and told the families of his victims that he had "no right to take your loved ones from you, and I ask and pray; hope and pray that one day you find it in your hearts to forgive me for those actions." "No amount of my apologies will ever return them to you. And if you feel that this is what you need to get you closure, I pray it helps you have that closure," he said. "I am deeply sorry. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton said in a statement that Tabler was pronounced dead at 6:38 p.m. In April 2007, Tabler was convicted by a Bell County, Texas, jury of capital murder for the Nov. 25, 2004, deaths of Rahmouni and Zayed. According to court documents, Tabler planned to kill Rahmouni. Armed with a camcorder and a 9mm handgun, Tabler called Rahmouni that Thanksgiving and offered to sell him cheap stereo equipment and instructed him to meet in a parking lot. Zayed drove Rahmouni to the location. When in the parking lot, Tabler opened fire on the two victims. Court documents state that Tabler then pulled both men from their vehicle and shot Rahmouni, who was still alive, while an accomplice videotaped the crime. Tabler was arrested four days later and confessed to police. He also told investigators that he killed two women whom he thought could connect him with the murders of Rahmouni and Zayed. "More than 20 years after his violent murder spree during Thanksgiving weekend, Richard Lee Tabler has been held accountable for his heinous actions," Paxton said. "The State of Texas has carried out the sentence imposed by a jury of the defendant's peers, delivering justice for the victims and their families." State of Death Penalty in U.S. The executions of Ford and Tabler are the fourth and fifth to be conducted in the United States this year. Tabler is also the second person to be executed in Texas. All but one of the executions were by lethal injection, with Demetrius Terrence Frazier -- who was executed by Alabama last week for the 1991 rape and murder of a 41-year-old -- having been killed by nitrogen hypoxia. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, 12 death row inmates have so far been scheduled for execution in South Carolina, Texas, Louisiana, Arizona, Oklahoma and Ohio. On his first day in office, Jan. 20, President Donald Trump issued an executive order directing the Justice Department to pursue death penalty sentences in cases where applicable. The last time the federal government executed a person was during Trump's first administration in 2020. Daniel Lewis Lee, who was put to death in Indiana, was also the first federal execution in 17 years.
USA Today
13-02-2025
- Politics
- USA Today
Louisiana, Arizona end pauses on capital punishment as 3 executions set for March
Louisiana, Arizona end pauses on capital punishment as 3 executions set for March Three states have scheduled executions in March, including one eyeing a controversial nitrogen gas method in order to carry it out and another state that struggled to insert IVs into three separate inmates during their lethal injections. Louisiana's execution of Christopher Sepulvado on March 17 would mark the end of a 15-year break in executions in the state, which plans to use nitrogen gas. Arizona's execution of Aaron Gunches on March 19 would be the first in the state since 2022, when the state struggled to carry out three executions. Meanwhile South Carolina is set to execute its fourth inmate since September, when the state reinstated the practice after a 13-year pause. "The resumption of executions in states which have not killed prisoners in over a decade is a troubling last gasp for the death penalty in the United States," Abraham Bonowitz, executive director of Death Penalty Action, told USA TODAY on Wednesday. "Killing old men decades after their crimes does not make us safer, nor does it bring back the victims in these cases." Republican Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry said in a statement Monday that "justice will be dispensed." 'For too long, Louisiana has failed to uphold the promises made to victims of our State's most violent crimes," he said. "I anticipate the national press will embellish on the feelings and interests of the violent death row murderers, we will continue to advocate for the innocent victims and the loved ones left behind." So far this year, the U.S. has executed three inmates, with two more scheduled to die and on Thursday and at least 12 more by the end of the year. Here's what to know about the newly scheduled executions. Louisiana ends prohibition on death penalty A De Soto Parish judge granted a death warrant Tuesday for 81-year-old Christopher Sepulvado to be executed on March 17 for the murder of his 6-year-old stepson in 1993. Attorney General Liz Murrill told The Associated Press that the state will use nitrogen gas and expects to execute four inmates this year. The Rev. Jeff Hood, a spiritual advisor for Death Row inmates and anti-death penalty activist, was a witness to the first nitrogen gas execution in the United States − that of Kenny Eugene Smith on Jan. 25, 2024 − and described it as being "horrific." "Kenny was shaking the entire gurney. I had never seen something so violent," Hood wrote in a column for USA TODAY following the execution of Kenneth Smith. "There was nothing in his body that was calm. Everything was going everywhere all at once, over and over." Sepulvado's attorney, Shawn Nolan, told KTBS-TV that the inmate is in poor health and confined to a wheelchair. "Chris Sepulvado is a debilitated old man suffering from serious medical ailments," he said. "There is no conceivable reason why 'justice' might be served by executing Chris instead of letting him live out his few remaining days in prison." Arizona to restart executions after review The Arizona State Supreme Court granted a warrant of execution for Aaron Gunches on Tuesday, setting the first execution in the state in more than two years for March 19, reported The Arizona Republic − a part of the USA TODAY Network. Gunches was sentenced to death for the 2002 murder of Ted Price, a former longtime boyfriend of Gunches' girlfriend. Gunches has advocated for his execution, and the state's Supreme Court previously granted a death warrant for him in 2023 that was not completed when Democratic state leadership paused executions upon taking office. Gov. Katie Hobbs and Attorney General Kris Mayes suspended capital punishment pending a review of Arizona's death penalty process because the state struggled to insert IVs for three lethal injection executions in 2022: those of Clarence Dixon, Frank Atwood and Murray Hooper. Dixon's attorneys said it took 40 minutes to insert IVs. Dixon's execution team resorted to inserting an IV line into his femoral vein, which caused him to experience pain and resulted in a "fair amount of blood," according to Associated Press reporter Paul Davenport, who witnessed the execution. The execution team for Atwood also struggled to insert IVs, prompting technicians to consider the femoral vein, as well. However, Atwood asked the team to try his arms again, eventually guiding them to insert the line into one of his hands successfully. During Hooper's execution, he turned and asked the viewing gallery, 'Can you believe this?' as the execution team tried and failed repeatedly to insert IVs into his arms before inserting a catheter into his femoral vein. Hobbs ended the review process late last year, and Mayes announced she was pursuing the execution of Gunches. State officials have said there will now be additional members on the execution team, including a phlebotomist. During previous executions, the IV team was sometimes staffed with corrections officers. South Carolina to execute fourth person in five months Meanwhile the South Carolina Supreme Court on Friday scheduled a March 7 execution date for Brad Sigmon for the 2001 murder of a couple and the kidnapping of their daughter, according to the Greenville News − a part of the USA TODAY Network. Sigmon would be the fourth man executed by the state since September if the execution is completed, following Freddie 'Khalil' Owens, Richard Moore and Marion Bowman last month. Lawyers representing Sigmon, 67, filed a motion last week to stay Sigmon's executionafter reviewing Moore's autopsy. According to the motion, the previous three men remained alive for 20 minutes after receiving a dose of pentobarbital, and Moore had to be injected a second time. 'This raises grave concerns: that during all three of SCDC's recent executions, the drugs were either not properly administered, not reliable and effective, or all of the above,' according to the motion. USA TODAY reached out to the South Carolina Department of Corrections for a response.
