Good news from Huntsville TX

Inmate executed for slayings of elderly Paris, Texas, couple

Larry Wooten stole $500 from the victims so he could buy cocaine.

HUNTSVILLE — A Texas man convicted for the slayings of an elderly couple found brutally beaten and stabbed in their home more than 14 years ago was executed Thursday.

Larry Wooten was condemned to death for the 1996 murders of 80-year-old Grady Alexander and his 86-year-old wife, Bessie, in the northeast Texas town of Paris.

The Alexanders were beaten with a cast-iron skillet and a pistol, stabbed and had their throats slit and heads almost severed. Prosecutors said Wooten robbed the couple, taking their savings of $500 so he could buy cocaine... 

Gee, nice guy.

"I don't have nothing to say. You can go ahead and send me home to my heavenly father," Wooten said.

He cried as the drugs were administered and let out one final gasp as the lethal injection took effect. Nine minutes later, at 6:21 p.m. CDT, he was pronounced dead.

Hopefully for you Wooten your last judge will be in a more merciful mode than your last.

...Kerye Ashmore, a former Lamar County district attorney who prosecuted the case, called Wooten a "scary guy" with a history of violence, including a prior conviction for assaulting an elderly woman after breaking into her home. He also was a person of interest in the slaying of another elderly woman in Paris who was killed a couple of weeks before the Alexanders, Ashmore said.

"If you are going to have a death penalty, this is the kind of people you want to have the death penalty for," said Ashmore, who is now the first assistant district attorney in nearby Grayson County.

No argument there...he is a classic case. But you gotta love this.

In his appeal to the Supreme Court, Wooten's attorneys argued he wouldn't have turned down a plea bargain if he knew about additional DNA evidence that didn't become available until after his trial began.

Wooten had turned down a plea agreement of life in prison after DNA experts working for his trial attorneys believed the blood evidence didn't reliably connect him to the crime. But after the trial began, additional lab results showed the DNA evidence was stronger than originally thought, Wooten's appeals said.

...The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in March that both sides are at risk in a plea offer and there's no constitutional right to a plea bargain.

Ah, don't you just hate it when you get your ass bitten by the law...

In prior appeals, Wooten had claimed he should not be executed because he is mentally retarded. But his claim was denied as tests put his IQ between 77 and 84. An IQ of 70 is considered the threshold for mental impairment.

But you are smart enough to turn down a plea bargain...don't you hate it when you bite yourself in the ass.

Good riddance to bad garbage.