Nebraska execution with opioid

LINCOLN, Neb. — Nebraska carried out its first execution in more than two decades on Tuesday with the lethal injection of a convicted murderer who had been on Death Row for nearly twice that long.

Carey Dean Moore (photo), 60, was pronounced dead at 10:47 a.m. after he was injected with a never-beforetried combination of drugs including the first use of the powerful opioid fentanyl. Moore, who had been sentenced to death for killing two cab drivers in Omaha in 1979, also was the first inmate to be lethally injected in Nebraska, which last carried out an execution in 1997, using the electric chair.

Moore's execution comes a little more than three years after Nebraska lawmakers abolished the death penalty, only to have it reinstated the following year through a citizen ballot drive partially financed by Republican Gov. Pete Ricketts. The governor, a wealthy former businessman, has said he was fulfilling the wishes of voters in the conservative state.

According to prosecutors, Moore was 21 when he fatally shot Reuel Van Ness during a robbery with his younger brother, and used the money to buy drugs and pornography.

Moore fatally shot Maynard Helgeland by himself five days later, saying he wanted to prove he could take a man's life by himself. Moore was arrested a week later.

He was charged and convicted of first-degree murder, while his 14-year-old brother was convicted of second-degree murder.

For some relatives of Moore's victims, that was far too long — and they hope his name and crimes will finally vanish from headlines.

“We're sick of hearing about Carey Dean Moore,” Steve Helgeland, one of Maynard Helgeland's three children, said ahead of the execution. “All we really want is for him to go away.”