Mercy bid fails as police officer killings accomplice is executed

● Convicted man dies from lethal injection in Alabama prison

A man convicted as an accomplice in the 2004 killings of three police officers in Alabama who were shot by another man was executed on Thursday evening.

Inmate Nathaniel Woods, 43, was pronounced dead at 9.01 pm local time following a lethal injection at the state prison in Atmore, authorities said. The inmate had no last words but appeared to arrange his hands in a sign of his Islamic faith.

Alabama’s first execution of the year came after a last minute bid to stop it, that included support from the son of civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., and others who argued it was unfair to execute a man who didn’t pull the trigger in the killing. The state of Alabama said Woods was an active participant in the killing and had bragged about it afterward in statements.

The US Supreme Court issued a temporary stay to consider last-minute appeals and then denied the inmate’s petitions. Woods and Kerry Spencer were convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death in the killings of the three Birmingham officers.

The officers’ deaths in a hail of gunfire rocked Alabama’s largest city in 2004. Carlos Owen, Harley A. Chisolm III and Charles R. Bennett died while trying to serve a domestic assault warrant on Woods at a suspected drug house. Prosecutors said Spencer was the triggerman, opening fire on the officers with a highpowered rifle inside the apartment, though Woods was convicted as an accomplice. Family members of the slain officers gave statements to the media after the execution, describing lives shattered.

“Nathaniel Woods chose his fate on June 17, 2004. That horrific day could have been prevented if he had any kind of compassion or respect for law enforcement,” Starr Sidelinker said in reading a statement on behalf of Chisholm’s sister. Greg Owen, the son of officer Owen, said in a written statement his father was a 58-year-old grandfather who only wanted to protect people in the city.

“Instead of going home that day, he was ambushed, murdered and died on the floor of a filthy drug house,” Mr Owen wrote. Testimony showed the officers approached a house where Woods and Spencer were believed to deal drugs; at least two other people were also inside. After talking to Woods through a back door, Owen and Chisholm entered. State lawyers wrote Woods said he was surrendering to officers when soon after Spencer opened fire with a highpowered rifle.