WASHINGTON: The southern US state of Arkansas, rushing to execute several inmates before a lethal drug expires at the end of the month, put to death today a prisoner convicted of raping and murdering a woman in 1995, the attorney general said.
Jack Jones was executed after the US Supreme Court rejected an 11th-hour appeal from his attorneys asking the justices to reconsider a procedural issue from his trial.
"This evening, Lacey Phillips Manor and Darla Phillips-Jones have seen justice for the brutal rape and murder of their mother, Mary Phillips," Arkansas Attorney General Leslie Rutledge said in a statement.
"Mary was performing her job as a bookkeeper in Bald Knob on June 6, 1995, when she was strangled to death with a coffeepot cord while her 11-year-old daughter Lacey clung to life a few feet away after being choked and beaten," Rutledge said.
"The Phillips family has waited far too long to see justice carried out, and I pray they find peace tonight."