KNOXVILLE, Tenn. (WATE) — The execution of Byron Black raised questions for weeks over Tennessee’s death penalty law in connection with intellectual disability and potential suffering. In this week’s Ask Isaacs, 6 News anchor Bo Williams and Attorney Greg Isaacs break down the legal battle ahead of Black’s execution and what Tennessee’s law says.
Black was executed by lethal injection at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville on Tuesday morning. During the execution, Black said he was “hurting so bad,” media witnesses recounted, agreeing that he appeared to be in discomfort. The witnesses also noted that Black lifted his head several times, which his lawyer, attorney Kelley Henry, said was a sign that the medication used in the execution, Pentobarbital, was not acting as state experts claimed it does.
Stand Your Ground Laws: What Tennessee law says on self-defense
Black’s execution comes more than 35 years after he was convicted of three counts of first-degree murder in the 1988 deaths of of his girlfriend Angela Clay and her two young daughters, LaToya, 9, and LaKeisha, 6 inside their Nashville home. 6 News’ sister station, WKRN, reported that at the time of the murders, Black was on work release for shooting and wounding Clay’s estranged husband.
Leading up to Black’s execution, a judge ruled in mid-July that Black’s implanted heart-regulating device, a cardioverter-defibrillator, had to be turned off before he could be executed. His attorneys argued that the device could shock him during the execution in an attempt to restore normal heart rhythm and cause extreme pain and suffering…