Idaho delays execution of serial killer Thomas Eugene Creech after 10 botched lethal injection attempts
Convicted serial killer Thomas Creech, who has been on Idaho’s death row for more than 40 years, was slated to be put to death on Wednesday — but his execution was delayed after 10 botched lethal injection attempts, his lawyers said.
Creech, 73, was wheeled into the execution chamber at the Idaho Maximum Security Institution on a gurney at 10 a.m. local time. The prison warden announced he was halting the inmate’s execution at 10:58 a.m.
“The medical team could not establish an IV line, rendering the execution unable to proceed,” Idaho Department of Correction Director Sanda Kuzeta-Cerimagic said in a statement.
Six state officials, including Attorney General Raul Labrador, and four reporters looked on as a trio of medics repeatedly tried — and failed — to establish an IV in the condemned inmate’s arms and legs.
The IV sites appeared to be in the crook of Creech’s arms, his hands, near his ankles and in his feet.
With each attempt to insert an IV, which took several minutes, the medical team would clean Creech’s skin with alcohol, inject a numbing solution, clean the skin again and then try to place the IV catheter in a vein.
Creech, whose arms were strapped to the table, extended his fingers toward his family members and advocates sitting in a separate viewing room and was spotted mouthing the words, “I love you” to someone.
After the execution was stopped, the warden approached Creech and whispered to him for several minutes, giving his arm a squeeze.
The Idaho DOC later announced that its death warrant for Creech will expire and that it will “consider next steps.”
Creech’s attorneys with the Federal Defender Services of Idaho claimed that state officials tried and failed 10 times to access veins in both of his arms and legs to inject him with the execution drug pentobarbital.
“We are angered but not surprised that the State of Idaho botched the execution of Thomas Creech today. This is what happens when unknown individuals with unknown training are assigned to carry out an execution,” they said in a statement.
The legal team immediately filed a new motion for a stay in US District Court.
“Given the badly botched execution attempt this morning, which proves IDOC’s inability to carry out a humane and constitutional execution, undersigned counsel preemptively seek an emergency stay of execution to prevent any further attempts today,” they said.
Creech, a native of Ohio, has been imprisoned since 1974, making him one of the longest-serving death row inmates in the country.
He has been convicted of five murders in three states — Idaho, California and Oregon — and suspected of at least six other killings.
In total, Creech has admitted to killing or participating in the murders of at least 26 people, according to court records.
As recently as last month, Creech was implicated in the 1974 fatal shooting of Daniel Walker in San Bernardino County, California, according to local authorities.
Creech was already serving a life sentence in 1981, when he bludgeoned to death a fellow inmate, 22-year-old David Jensen, with a sock stuffed with batteries — a crime that ultimately landed him on death row.
During his decades in lockup, Creech has dodged a dozen planned executions.
During a parole board meeting held in January to consider his clemency request, Creech expressed remorse for his actions.
“I regret everything that I’ve ever done wrong,” Creech told the panel, the Idaho Statesman reported.
“The person I am now is not the person I was then. Maybe the person I used to be didn’t deserve mercy at all. But I think I have a lot to offer to people.”
But prosecutors insisted that Creech was a “sociopath” who posed a risk to those around him.
In the leadup to Wednesday, his lawyers filed a flurry of appeals, claiming that his recent clemency hearing was unfair, that it was unconstitutional to kill him because he was sentenced by a judge rather than a jury and that he received ineffective assistance of counsel.
The courts found no grounds for leniency, and Creech’s last-minute petition to the US Supreme Court was rejected just hours before his latest execution attempt.
On Tuesday night, Creech spent time with his wife and ate what was supposed to be his last meal consisting of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy and ice cream.
Were it successful, Creech’s execution on Wednesday was to be Idaho’s first in 12 years.
