Nebraska conducts first US execution

CHICAGO: Nebraska on Tuesday (Wednesday in Manila) carried out

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the country’s deadly overdose crisis

four-drug combination.

Carey Dean Moore, sentenced to death for two 1979 murders,

the Midwestern state in 21 years, in what was its first ever lethal injection.

The 60-year-old was pronounced dead at 10:47 am (1547 GMT). The execution lasted approximately 20 minutes, according to Scott Frakes, director of the Nebraska Department of Correctional Services.

Moore’s execution survived a last-minute legal challenge from a drug company and protests about the new lethal injection protocol.

It was a pivotal test for Nebraska, where the state legislature abolished the death penalty in 2015, only to see voters reinstate it the next year in a referendum. The state last performed an execution in 1997 by electric chair.

The execution was carried out with “professionalism, respect for the process and dignity for all involved,” he said.

The lethal injection consisted of the sedative diazepam to bring on unconsciousness, the painkiller fentanyl citrate, the muscle relaxer cisatracurium to stop breathing, and potassium chloride to stop the heart.

Only potassium chloride has been used before in executions.

Moore had been on death row for 38 years and did not want further delays of his execution.

In 1980, while still in his early 20s, he was sentenced to death for the killings the year prior of two Omaha taxi drivers five days apart.

Expressing contrition, he ad-

driver during a robbery committed with his brother, and killing the second driver to “foolishly” prove to himself that he could commit murder on his own. - ed to a written statement dated

other Nebraska death row inmates who claim their innocence.

“I am guilty, they are not,” he wrote. “Why must they remain there one day longer?”

Moore also asked forgiveness from his brother.

Moore’s execution was the 16th in the United States this year, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.