William Earl Lynd's execution is first since key high court ruling
The Associated Press
updated 8:08 p.m. ET, Tues., May. 6, 2008
ATLANTA - Georgia executed a convicted murderer Tuesday, the first person to be put to death in the United States since the Supreme Court ended a de facto moratorium on capital punishment last month.

Witnesses said William Earl Lynd died by lethal injection at a prison in Jackson, in central Georgia, at 7:51 p.m. ET. He was convicted of killing his girlfriend, 26-year-old Ginger Moore, shooting her three times in the face and head nearly 20 years ago.

The Georgia Supreme Court on Tuesday had denied Lynd's request for a stay of execution, paving the way for him to become the first inmate in the nation to face execution since the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that lethal injection is constitutional.

The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles had also rejected Lynd's bid for clemency. Lynd's lawyer, Tom Dunn, had asked Georgia's top court to grant a stay so it could consider new forensic evidence. The court was unanimous in rejecting Lynd's appeal.

Not trying to be first, governor says
Georgia Gov. Sonny Perdue said the U.S. Supreme Court made the right decision on lethal injection but that the state had not rushed to be the first out of the gate.

"It was not something we wanted to necessarily be first at. It was just the fact that this had been there," Perdue said at a state Capitol news conference.

The Supreme Court ruled last month in a Kentucky case that the state's method of executing inmates with a three-drug cocktail did not violate the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. Roughly three dozen states, including Georgia, use a similar method.

Soon after the ruling, prosecutors in several of those states quickly moved to schedule executions that had been delayed as the court reviewed the issue. Besides Georgia, Mississippi on Monday scheduled an execution for later this month, while Texas announced plans to put a Mexican-born prisoner to death in August.

Lynd, 53, was sentenced to die for kidnapping and shooting Moore in south Georgia in 1988, after the two consumed Valium, marijuana and alcohol. Prosecutors said she suffered a slow, agonizing death, regaining consciousness twice after being shot in the head.

Texas carried out the nation's last execution, putting Michael Richard to death on Sept. 25, 2007, the same day the Supreme Court agreed to consider the Kentucky case. The Kentucky case was brought by two prisoners who claimed the lethal injection method violated the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Even if I consider the "eye for an eye" references, it just doesn't seem right. But locking someone away for 80 years doesn't seem right either. I like Superman. On Krypton, they put these criminals into another dimension and let them travel the cosmos in a relative limbo state so they may contemplate their frailties and their mistakes. But then there are people like Ted Bundy and Jeffrey Dalmer. Two of the worst serial killers of all time - and in my mind, clearly insane (that is - not subscribing to the "average" mindset about living in society). I really don't know.

In the Pentateuch, Yahweh and Moses proscribe death by stoning for murder. But in those days, the convicted would be stoned by members of his/her own community (including his close family members) - so you gotta figure that they only did it for the most vile of offenses. And they might have considered alternatives to "eye for an eye." In modern society, we rarely consider that Mosaic law was written in the context of community members (of a small community) carrying out these punishments. It does make a difference, in my view... The difference: adjudication by community members and the Levite judge down the road (Mosaic tradition) and sentence would be carried out by parents, first and second cousins, and other community members VS today: adjudication by strangers and (hopefully) a wise judge while defended by competent advocates; and sentence by "the state." It's a big difference all the way around...

Modern day capital punishment? I just don't know...

Hey wolfknight, Ralph Baze the cop killer from Powell County Kentucky who was one of those who brought up this case ... grew up two houses down from him. I do not condone cop killing by no means, but they(police) had been pestering him for years over petty crap. He told my cousin that the next time they came and got in his face that he was going to kill them ... nobody took him at his word.

Murder is still murder. Killing someone is against gods laws. Even the bible said(those of you the believe in the bible) talk a an eye for an eye. life for a life. I am sorry but I stongly support Capital punshment.

I do, too. As soon as you take a person's life, you should have no rights. By stealing someone else's right to live, you forfeit yours.

Thank you

Murder is politics and justice for the public and so be it.

Cant imagine being the mother, wife, sister, friend, father, husband, son or even acquintance of someone that has been since the dawn of time taken tragicly and visciously by a criminal.

Justice is served only if those that have lost love ones be allowed to flick the switch, drop the gate, or push just one button to make it worth it.
An example to all criminals.

I did find this.........
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ronald_Ryan

Reread your sentance. It is dripping with irony. Capital punishment is murder by another name. By that logic the family of the condemned man should be able to kill the doctor who injected the lethal dose. And the family of the doctor can kill the family who killed the doctor. so on, so on, so on. The problem with an eye for an eye thinking is that sooner or later everyone ends up blind.

Another thing to ponder. How many times have the wrong people been convicted? Really? Consider that. It happens. You can release a man from jail that has been wrongly convicted. Pretty tough to go back on lethal injection. Our legal system is far from perfect.

One down and a number of more to go.

Dont remember stating that he should'nt fry, BUT if killing someone is against god's laws then capital punishment is just that ... breaking god's laws.

it's pretty sad come to think of it....20 years on death row that's real long

But these are Gods laws. I think death row need to cleaned out. Instead we are spend 60 thousand a year to house them.

Cleaned out ... yes
God's laws are not the laws of the people unfortunatly.

The Old Testament laws are considered only when convenient. If we support the "eye for an eye" mandate, then let's not permit a woman to enter our house if she is in her "time of the month." Let not a woman enter a church. A rape would not be a rape if it happened in a city. Let's put a man to death for masturbating.

The United States is the only nation of the industrial first world that has a death penalty. It is barbaric and represents a primitive concept of logic wherein it is justified by references to laws existing in cultures 5,000 years ago.

Now the man is dead and, of course, the victim has returned to life, right? Murderers have the lowest recidivism of any crime group so "eliminating their threat to society" neither holds water.

Murder has been answered with murder. There is no other valid definition.

When you're in a long term relationship....you really start to see the wisdom in those words...

Whose god is that? Yours? Mine? His? They are not all the same you know, and dont all come with the same laws.

Interesting thing about the expense of housing death row inmates versus killing them; in the end it is cheaper to simply keep them in jail for life. The huge expenses involved in court case after court case far outweigh the expense of keeping them in jail.

Now, now, let's be nice. All you need to do is to have a good stash of chocolate in your house and things will be a lot better for you! LOL

Japan has the death penalty. As well as some others. I'f you like them so much have the murderers come live out thier lives at your home. Kill them if they kill. Its only fair. You end anothers life you lose yours.

Sorry, but I really do have to disagree. If we call Ted Bundy "insane" because he couldn't stop taking human lives don't we have to also describe Mother Theresa by the same term because she couldn't stop saving human lives? If both were compelled to carry out their actions, driven like loose straw before the storm wind, with no personal choice in the behaviors they carried out, where is the moral difference?

To me the difference is that Mother Theresa was GOOD and Ted Bundy EVIL.

I've never been crazy about the death penalty, but I believe it has to be kept in place for the most heinous murderers.

Otherwise what do we do with Lifers who continue to kill other inmates or guards in prison? Give them "Life"? But we already did that!

I appreciate your correction much more than your saracasm. My right to an opinion should not be diminished only because it conflicts with yours.

In my eyes, some people do indeed deserve death, and others don't. The type of killing that I see as wrong, is killing someone for reasons that do not fit the punishment. For instance, killing someone because they almost ran you over by accident with their car. Now, on the other hand, I think killing someone as vile and horrific as Hitler, would be a job well done!

Murder may be murder, but the motive is what's important.