Nashville, Tenn. – A man from Tennessee who killed his wife and two teenage children were scheduled to be executed on Thursday morning, three years after he was saved by a last minute.
Oscar Smith, 75, was scheduled to receive a lethal injection of the barbituric Pentobarbital At 10:10 am Smith has always claimed to be innocent and In an interview With Associated Press recently, he mainly wanted to discuss the ways in which he felt that the judicial system had failed him.
He was convicted of fatally stabbing and shooting his separate wife, Judith Smith, Jason Burnett, 13, and Chad Burnett, 16, in his home in Nashville, Tennessee, on October 1, 1989. He was sentenced to death by a jury of the County of Davidson in July 1990 by the murders.
In 2022, a judge of the Criminal Court of Davidson County denied requests to reopen his case Despite some new evidence that the DNA of an unknown person was in one of the homicidal weapons. The judge wrote that the Evidence of Smith’s guilt He was overwhelming and DNA’s evidence did not turn the balance in his favor.
Tennessee executions have been waiting for five years, first due to COVID-19 and then by False steps by the Tennessee Correction Department.
Smith arrived within a few minutes of the execution in 2022 before he was saved by a surprise postponement of Republican governor Bill Lee. Later it turned out that the lethal drugs that were going to be used in it had not been properly tested. A posterior one -year research He learned numerous other problems with Tennessee executions.
The correction department issued new execution guidelines in December. He New Execution Manual It contains only one page in lethal injection chemicals without specific instructions to test medicines. It also eliminates the requirement that medications come from a licensed pharmacist. Smith’s lawyer, Amy Harwell, has characterized it in this way: “It’s as if, having been caught breaking her own rules, Tdoc decided:” We just don’t have rules. “
The new protocols are subject to a demand filed by Smith and other death inmates. A trial in that case is scheduled for next January.
