On Wednesday, Idaho halted the execution of serial killer Thomas Eugene Creech after medical team members failed after eight attempts to find a vein where they could establish an intravenous line to carry out the lethal injection.

73-year-old Thomas Eugene Creech has been in prison for half a century. Creech was convicted of five murders in three states and suspected of several more. He was already serving a life term when he beat a fellow inmate, David Dale Jensen (22) to death in 1981, the crime for which he was to be executed.

Creech is one of the longest-serving death row inmates in the U.S. At 10 a.m., he was wheeled into the execution chamber at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution on a gurney.

Department of Correction Director Josh Tewalt told a news conference afterward that three medical team members tried eight times to establish an IV. In some cases, they couldn’t access the vein, and in others, they could but had concerns about vein quality. They attempted sites in his arms, legs, hands, and feet. At one point, a member of the medical team left to gather more supplies.

At 10:58 a.m., the warden announced he was halting the execution.

The corrections department said its death warrant for Creech would expire and that it was considering the next steps. Josh Tewalt said that while other medical procedures might allow for the execution, the state is mindful of the 8th Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Creech’s lawyers immediately filed a new motion for a stay in U.S. District Court, saying the badly botched execution attempt proves the department’s inability to carry out a humane and constitutional execution. The court granted the stay after Idaho confirmed it would not try again to execute him before the death warrant expired; the state would have to obtain another warrant if it wanted to carry out the execution.

As per Agence France Presse, the Federal Defender Services of Idaho said in a written statement that this is what happens when unknown individuals with unknown training are assigned to carry out an execution. Further, they added that this is precisely the kind of mishap they warned the state and the courts could experience when attempting to execute one of the country’s oldest death row inmates.

There were about six Idaho officials on hand to witness the attempt, including Attorney General Raul Labrador, and four news media representatives, including an Associated Press reporter, which was to be Idaho’s first execution in 12 years.

The execution team was made up entirely of volunteers, the corrections department stated. Those tasked with inserting the IVs and administering the lethal drug had medical training, but their identities were kept secret. To conceal their faces, they wore white balaclava-style face coverings and navy scrub caps.

According to Agence France Presse, the medical team cleaned the skin with alcohol, injected a numbing solution, cleaned the skin again, and then attempted to place the IV catheter. Each attempt took a few minutes, as medical team members stroked the skin and tried to position the needles.

However, Creech always looked toward his family members and representatives, who were sitting in a separate witness room. Although his arms were strapped to the table, he often extended his fingers toward them.

Creech appeared to mouth “I love you” to someone in the room on occasion.

(Input from various sources)

(Rehash/Komal Bhoi/MSM)

References:

1. Agence France Presse (https://www.afp.com/en)