Missouri carries out 1st U.S. execution since pandemic began
BONNE TERRE, Mo. — A Missouri man was put to death by injection Tuesday for fatally stabbing an 81-year-old woman nearly three decades ago, the first U.S. execution since the coronavirus pandemic took hold.
Walter Barton, 64, had long maintained he was innocent of killing Gladys Kuehler, and his case was tied up for years due to appeals, mistrials and two overturned convictions. His fate was sealed when neither the courts nor Gov. Mike Parson intervened.
Concerns related to the coronavirus caused several states to postpone or cancel executions over the past 2 1/2 months. Until Tuesday, no one had been executed in the U.S. since Nathaniel Woods was put to death in
Alabama on March 5. Ohio, Tennessee and Texas were among states calling off executions. Texas delayed six executions due to the pandemic.
Barton’s attorney, Fred Duchardt Jr., and attorneys for death row inmates in the other states argued that the pandemic prevented them from safely conducting thorough investigations for clemency petitions and last-minute appeals. They said they were unable to secure records or conduct interviews due to closures.
Attorneys also expressed concerns about interacting with individuals and possibly being exposed to the virus, and they worried that the close proximity of witnesses and staff at executions could lead to spread of COVID19, the disease caused by the coronavirus.
Barton was executed in Bonne Terre, Missouri, about 60 miles south of St. Louis, at a prison that has no confirmed cases of the virus. Strict protocols were in place to protect workers and visitors from exposure to the coronavirus.
Everyone entering the prison had their temperatures checked. Face coverings were required, and the prison provided masks for those who didn’t have them.
But several employees clocking in and out for the day, without masks, came into the same room used by media prior to and after the execution. They remained more than six feet away from the lone reporter in the media room at the time.
Witnesses were divided into three rooms. Those witnesses include an Associated Press reporter and other journalists and state witnesses, and people there to support Barton.