Oklahoma executes James Coddington for 1997 hammer killing

McALESTER, Okla. — Oklahoma executed a person Thursday for a 1997 killing, regardless of a advice from the state’s Pardon and Parole Board that his life be spared.

James Coddington, 50, acquired a deadly injection on the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester and was pronounced lifeless at 10:16 a.m. Gov. Kevin Stitt declined to commute Coddington’s sentence to life in jail with out parole and rejected his petition for clemency. Coddington was the fifth Oklahoma inmate to be put to loss of life because the state resumed executions final 12 months.

“To all my household and buddies, attorneys, everybody who’s been round me and liked me, thanks,” Coddington mentioned whereas strapped to a gurney contained in the loss of life chamber. “Gov. Stitt, I do not blame you and I forgive you.”

After delivering his final phrases, Coddington lifted his head and flashed a thumbs as much as his legal professional, Emma Rolls, who cried quietly within the witness room.

After the primary drug, midazolam, was administered, Coddington’s respiration grew to become labored and his chest hitched a number of instances. A physician on the execution workforce declared him unconscious at 10:08 a.m., and Coddington might be heard loud night breathing contained in the chamber.

Coddington was convicted and sentenced to die for beating 73-year-old Albert Hale to loss of life with a hammer. Prosecutors say Coddington, then 24, grew to become enraged when Hale refused to present him cash to purchase cocaine.

Throughout a clemency listening to this month earlier than the state’s five-member Pardon and Parole Board, an emotional Coddington apologized to Hale’s household and mentioned he was a unique man right now.

However Mitch Hale, Albert Hale’s son who witnessed the execution, mentioned he did not consider Coddington was sincerely remorseful, noting that he by no means talked about his father or the Hale household throughout his final phrases.

“He proved right now it wasn’t real. He by no means apologized,” Hale mentioned. “He did not carry up my dad.”

Hale added: “I forgive him, however that does not launch him from the results of his actions.”

Rolls, Coddington’s legal professional, mentioned through the clemency listening to that Coddington was impaired by years of alcohol and drug abuse that started as an toddler when his father put beer and whiskey into his child bottles.

Coddington was twice sentenced to loss of life for Hale’s killing, the second time in 2008 after his preliminary sentence was overturned on attraction.

After killing Hale, Coddington dedicated at the least six armed robberies at gasoline stations and comfort shops throughout Oklahoma Metropolis.

“When the total circumstances of the homicide, associated robberies, and intensive historical past of violence on Mr. Coddington’s half are thought-about, one factor is obvious: loss of life is the one simply punishment for him,” prosecutors within the state legal professional common’s workplace wrote to the Pardon and Parole Board.

The state had halted executions in September 2015 when jail officers realized they had acquired the incorrect deadly drug. It later got here to mild that the identical incorrect drug had been used to execute an inmate, and executions within the state had been placed on maintain.