Alabama to execute a long-serving death row inmate for the 1988 beating death of a woman he dated

[ad_1] This photograph supplied by the Alabama Division of Corrections exhibits Gregory Hunt, who's scheduled to be executed in Alabama on Tuesday, June 10, 2025. He was convicted of the 1988 homicide of Karen Lane. (Alabama Division of Corrections by way of AP)

ATMORE, Ala. (AP) — A person convicted of beating a girl to dying practically 37 years in the past is scheduled to be executed Tuesday in Alabama in what would be the nation's sixth execution with nitrogen fuel.

Gregory Hunt is scheduled to be put to dying Tuesday evening at a south Alabama jail. Hunt was convicted of killing Karen Lane, a girl he had been relationship for a couple of month, in keeping with courtroom information.

The Alabama execution is one among 4 that had been scheduled this week in america. Executions are additionally scheduled in Florida and South Carolina. A choose in Oklahoma on Monday issued a short lived keep for an execution in that state, however the state legal professional basic is looking for to get it lifted.

Lane was 32 when she was murdered Aug. 2, 1988, within the Cordova house she shared with a girl who was Hunt's cousin.

Prosecutors mentioned Hunt broke into her house and killed her after sexually abusing her. A doctor who carried out an post-mortem testified that she died from blunt power trauma and that Lane had sustained some 60 accidents, together with 20 to the pinnacle.

A jury on June 19, 1990, discovered Hunt responsible of capital homicide throughout sexual abuse and housebreaking. Jurors beneficial by a vote of 11-1 that he obtain a dying sentence, which a choose imposed.

Hunt's ultimate request for a keep of execution, which he filed himself, targeted on claims that prosecutors made false statements to jurors about proof of sexual abuse. The aspect of sexual abuse is what elevated the crime to a dying penalty offense.

In a submitting to the U.S. Supreme Court docket, Hunt, performing as his personal legal professional, wrote {that a} prosecutor instructed jurors that cervical mucus was on a broomstick close to Hunt’s physique. Nevertheless, the sufferer didn't have a cervix due to an earlier hysterectomy. The Alabama legal professional basic’s workplace known as the declare meritless and mentioned even when the prosecutor erred in that assertion, it didn't throw the conviction into doubt.

Hunt, talking by phone final month from jail, didn't dispute killing Lane however maintained he didn't sexually assault her. He additionally described himself as somebody who was modified by jail.

“Karen didn’t deserve what occurred to her,” Hunt mentioned.

Hunt mentioned he had been ingesting and doing medication on the evening of the crime and have become jealous when he noticed Lane in a automotive with one other man.

“You've gotten your come-to-Jesus second. After all, after the actual fact, you'll be able to't imagine what has occurred. You may't imagine you have been a part of it and did it,” Hunt mentioned.

Hunt, who was born in 1960 and got here to dying row in 1990, is now among the many longest-serving inmates on Alabama's dying row. He mentioned jail grew to become his “hospital” to heal his damaged thoughts. He mentioned since 1988, he has been main a Bible class attended by two dozen or extra inmates.

“Simply making an attempt to be a light-weight in a darkish place, making an attempt to inform folks if I can change, they will too. ... develop into folks of affection as a substitute of hate," he mentioned.

Lane’s sister declined to remark when reached by phone. The household is anticipated to provide a written assertion Tuesday evening.

“The best way she was killed is simply devastating,” Denise Gurganus, Lane’s sister, instructed TV station WBRC at a 2014 vigil for crime victims. “It’s laborious sufficient to lose a member of the family to dying, however when it’s this ugly.”

The Alabama legal professional basic's workplace, in asking justices to reject Hunt's request for a keep of execution, wrote that Hunt has now been on dying row longer than Lane was alive.

Alabama final yr grew to become the primary state to hold out an execution with nitrogen fuel. Nitrogen has now been utilized in 5 executions — 4 in Alabama and one in Louisiana. The tactic includes utilizing a fuel masks to power an inmate to breathe pure nitrogen fuel, depriving them of the oxygen wanted to remain alive.

Hunt had named nitrogen as his most popular execution methodology. He made the choice earlier than Alabama had developed procedures for utilizing fuel. Alabama additionally permits inmates to decide on deadly injection or the electrical chair.