June 17, 2014 - 9:18 PM
JACKSON, Ga. - A Georgia inmate convicted of rape and murder has become the first person to be executed in the U.S. since the botched lethal injection of a prisoner in Oklahoma in April.
Fifty-nine-year-old Marcus Wellons was executed by injection Tuesday night after last-minute appeals were denied. A corrections spokesman says he was pronounced dead at 11:56 p.m., more than an hour after the procedure began. The execution seemed to go smoothly with no noticeable complications.
Wellons was convicted and sentenced to die in 1993 for the 1989 death of his 15-year-old neighbour, India Roberts, a high school sophomore from the Atlanta suburbs.
Authorities say Wellons raped and strangled the teen. Roberts' body was found in a wooded area near the apartment building.
Georgia uses one drug — the sedative pentobarbital — for executions. Oklahoma uses three.
News from © The Associated Press, 2014