Friday, December 15, 2006

"cruel and unusual punishment".

The Independent reports it took 34 minutes and required a second injection to execute a man in Florida . Angel Nieves Diaz, 55, a Puerto Rican convicted of murdering a bar manager in Miami in 1979 , moments before his execution again denied the murder. There were no eyewitnesses but Diaz's girlfriend, had told police he had been involved in the killing .The governor of Diaz's native Puerto Rico, which abolished capital punishment in 1929, had sought clemency for him but Jeb Bush refused the appeals .

The execution showed that Angel Diaz had been conscious after the administration of a supposedly lethal dose . Witnesses said he was moving and trying to speak .

In his final appeal to the US Supreme Court Diaz challenged the execution chemicals saying they constituted a "cruel and unusual punishment". His appeal was rejected an hour before the execution began.

"Cruel" , yes , but unfortunately no longer "unusual" in the United States

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