He read Psalm 34, ending with: "The Lord redeems the soul of his servants, and none of those who trust in him shall be condemned."A Texas man who unsuccessfully challenged the safety of the state's lethal injection drugs and raised questions about evidence used to persuade a jury to sentence him to death for killing an elderly woman decades ago was executed late Tuesday.
He then began a lengthy recitation of Psalm 34, ending with: "The Lord redeems the soul of his servants, and none of those who trust in him shall be condemned."After telling the warden he was ready, Murphy turned his head toward a friend watching through a window a few feet from him, telling her, "God bless all of y'all. It's OK. Tell my babies I love them.
In their filings, Murphy's attorneys had questioned evidence of two robberies and a kidnapping used by prosecutors to persuade jurors during the penalty phase of his trial that Murphy would be a future danger - a legal finding needed to secure a death sentence in Texas. "A capital inmate who waits until the eleventh hour to raise long-available claims should not get to complain that he needs more time to litigate them," the attorney general's office wrote in its petition to the high court.
Murphy's lawyers had said he also had a long history of mental illness, was abused as a child and was in and out of foster care.