MONTGOMERY, Ala. — Alabama has scheduled a September execution by nitrogen gasoline for a person convicted of killing a comfort retailer clerk throughout a 1997 theft.
Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey set a Sept. 25 execution date for Geoffrey Todd West. West, now 49, is on the demise row for killing Margaret Parrish Berry.
Prosecutors stated West drove to Harold’s Chevron in Attalla with plans to rob the shop the place he as soon as labored. Berry, 33, was shot behind the pinnacle whereas mendacity on the ground behind the counter, prosecutors stated.
Courtroom data state that $250 was taken from a cookie can that held the shop’s cash.
A jury convicted West of capital homicide and voted 10-2 to suggest a demise sentence. A choose adopted the jury’s advice and sentenced West to demise.
Etowah County Circuit Choose William Cardwell through the 1999 sentencing stated it was troublesome to order the execution of a younger man however stated the capturing demise was “clearly deliberate and intentional, carried out execution model.”
Prosecutors additionally charged West’s girlfriend with the slaying. She pleaded responsible and was sentenced to 35 years in jail.
Alabama final 12 months turned the first state to hold out an execution with nitrogen gasoline, a technique that entails pumping nitrogen by a face masks and depriving the inmate of oxygen.
The strategy has now been utilized in six executions — five in Alabama and one in Louisiana. Alabama has scheduled another nitrogen execution in August.
West was one among a number of Alabama inmates who chosen nitrogen as their most well-liked execution technique after state lawmakers licensed the strategy. He made the choice earlier than Alabama developed procedures for the strategy.
