South Carolina executed Freddie Eugene Owens in the shooting death of a convenience store clerk on Friday as his mother begged state officials to reconsider, saying they were committing a “grave injustice” in light of a new sworn statement from a key witness in the case.
Owens , 46, was executed by lethal injection at the Broad Broad River Correctional Institute in Columbia, becoming the first inmate to be put to death by the state in more than a decade and the 14th in the nation this year. His execution began at 6:35 p.m. ET and he was pronounced dead 20 minutes later at 6:55 p.m.
A South Carolina jury found Owens guilty of murdering Irene Grainger Graves, 41, a single mother of three whose son described her as a hard-working and fun mom in an interview with USA TODAY this week .
“Freddie Owens did not kill Ms. Graves. His death tonight is a tragedy,” his attorney, Gerald “Bo” King, told USA TODAY in a statement. “Mr. Owens’s childhood was marked by suffering on a scale that is hard to comprehend. He spent his adulthood in prison for a crime that he did not commit. The legal errors, hidden deals, and false evidence that made tonight possible should shame us all.”