The state of Texas has just carried out its 600th execution since 1982, despite lawyers’ appeal to overturn the decision due to the individual’s intellectual disability. Edward Lee Busby Jr. was declared dead after a lethal injection for the murder, in 2004, of Laura Lee Crane, a retired 77-year-old university professor.
In his final statement, Mr. Busby apologized to his family and to Ms. Crane’s family and asked for forgiveness, as per a transcript provided by the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. “Mrs. Crane was a lovely woman, I never meant to hurt her. I am truly sorry,” he stated according to the document.
Mr. Busby’s lawyers tried to prevent the execution, arguing that he was intellectually disabled and therefore ineligible for the death penalty, which would be deemed “cruel and unusual” in this case and prohibited by the Constitution.
The U.S. Supreme Court, led by conservative judges, rejected the appeal, overturning the suspension of the execution issued by a lower court. This execution brings the total to 12 since the beginning of the year in the United States.
Mr. Busby became the 600th person to be executed in Texas since 1982, the year when the southern state resumed the practice of capital punishment. Texas is the state in the U.S. with the highest number of death sentences, accounting for one-third of all executions in the country.
The death penalty has been abolished in 23 out of the 50 American states. Three others, California, Oregon, and Pennsylvania, have halted executions by the governor’s decision.
