Texas inmate executed for 1979 rape, murder
HUNTSVILLE, Texas — A Texas prisoner accused of four killings and at least nine rapes was executed Wednesday for a 1979 rape and murder in Houston that went unsolved for two decades until he confessed.
Danny Paul Bible, 66, received lethal injection Wednesday evening after unsuccessful appeals contended his multiple health issues made it likely his execution would be botched and cause him unconstitutional pain. The U.S. Supreme Court rejected a last-day appeal about an hour before he was put to death without apparent complications.
Asked by the warden if he had a final statement, Bible replied: “No, sir.”
His head was shaking slightly as the lethal dose of the sedative pentobarbital began. His attorneys said Parkinson’s disease was among his ailments.
As the drug started to take effect, Bible started taking quick breaths, muttered at one point that it was “burning” and that it “hurt.” His breaths then became snores and about a minute after the procedure began, all movement stopped.
Despite fears from his attorneys that a vein would not be found for the IVs, prison technicians had one needle inserted in his left hand three minutes after he was strapped to the death chamber gurney. The second IV was inserted in his right hand after another three minutes.
He stared intently at relatives of two of his victims who watched through a window a few feet from him, but never said anything to them.
He was pronounced dead at 6:32 p.m., about 15 minutes after the lethal dose started. The execution was the seventh this year in Texas, the country’s most active death penalty state.
“Danny Paul Bible is as vile and evil a person that has ever drawn breath,” said Larry Lance, whose sister, Pam Hudgins, was among Bible’s victims. “We are glad to have witnessed him draw his last breath. I know he will burn in hell for eternity.”
Bible’s guilt was not disputed, but his lawyers had proposed he be rolled in his wheelchair in front of a firing squad or be administered nitrogen gas to cut off oxygen to his brain until he stopped breathing. Lawyers argued his deteriorating health left his veins unsuitable for IVs to be inserted.