The Real Walking Dead

 “We all gotta go some time.” It’s not just a cliché; it’s reality. Immortals do not walk this earth. Most people don’t usually know when or under what conditions the Grim Reaper will come calling. Clayton D. Lockett knew both when and how he would die. A jury of his peers had decided his fate in August 2000.

Eighteen year-old Stephanie Michelle Neiman had no inkling when or how she would die before June 7, 1999. Just the month previously Neiman had graduated from high school. She had her whole life ahead of her. She also had no idea the gruesome method her death would take.

Authorities in Perry, Oklahoma say the crime spree started when Clayton Lockett drove his younger cousin Alfonzo Lockett, 17, and Shawn Mathis, 26, to the Perry, Oklahoma home of Bobby Lee Bornt, 23. Bornt owed Clayton Lockett money.

Bornt was tied up and beaten, authorities said, while his 9-month-old son was in the house witnessing the beating. During the assault, Neiman and an 18-year-old friend stopped by Bornt's house, authorities said. "It was bad timing," Perry police Lt. David Farrow said.

Neiman's female friend told authorities she was pulled into the house and hit in the face with a shotgun. With a gun at her head, she was forced to call Neiman inside. Neiman also was hit with the shotgun and suffered a cut near her left eye.

But that was only the beginning of the nightmare that would end her life. The three men, Clayton Lockett, Alfonzo Lockett and Mathis took turns gang raping and sodomizing Neiman and her friend. According to Bornt, when Neiman refused to give Lockett the keys to her pickup truck or promise that she would not go to police after her assailants beat and assaulted her, Lockett took Neiman to a shallow grave that one of the co-defendants dug. Bornt said he saw a flash from a shotgun that Lockett carried, and heard Neiman scream.

Bornt testified that Lockett came back to the road where the co-defendants were holding him and another female and told them the shotgun was jammed. Lockett found a file in Bornt's truck and fixed the shotgun, and then returned to Neiman, who was groaning. Bornt said he saw a second flash of gunfire, and then heard no more groaning. Bornt and his then 9-month-old son and the other girl were released after promising they would not go to police.

Although Lockett’s cousin and Mathis were tried and received lengthy sentences, Clayton Lockett was sentenced to death by lethal injection. Nearly fourteen years later Lockett’s date with the executioner came due.

Lethal injection executions throughout the country have been jeopardized by the lack of approved drugs to “humanely” dispatch convicted killers. But Oklahoma would try a new method on Lockett and a second killer Charles F. Warner, also scheduled to die that day.

First, a strong sedative would be injected to put the subject to sleep then two more drugs would paralyze him and stop his heart. It seems that somehow, the sedative did not completely knock Lockett out, and he began to writhe when the other drugs were injected. At one point, the execution was halted. Lockett died of heart failure 43 minutes later. Warner’s execution has been put on hold pending an investigation.

Did Lockett suffer before dying? I certainly hope so. This pillar of the community gave no such consideration to Stephanie Neiman when he shot her with a shotgun, buried her alive, then shot her again when he heard her groan. Did Neiman suffer while she was sodomized and endured gang rape by these three choirboys? To my way of thinking, Lockett could not suffer enough.

And what of the other upstanding citizen scheduled for death that day? Charles Warner was convicted of raping and murdering 11-month-old Adrianna Waller in 1997 in Oklahoma County. He was convicted in 1999. Adrianna was the daughter of Warner's live-in girlfriend. During the sentencing phase, jurors heard testimony that he had previously sexually and physically abused his ex-wife and a five-year-old girl. Warner's seven-year-old son testified for the prosecution that he had witnessed his father abuse Adrianna on previous occasions. During the ultimately fatal attack, she was sexually molested. She had a six-inch skull fracture, a broken jaw, three broken ribs, bruised lungs and a lacerated liver and spleen.

God forbid Mr. Warner should suffer the same fate as Clayton Lockett.

This unfortunate event – unfortunate for society, not the convicts – has added fuel to the anti-capital punishment movement in this country and probably across the globe. There are countries where death by hanging is still practiced, others engage in stoning and beheading those convicted of crimes. Yet, we Americans yearn for a “humane” way to rid society of the worst of the worst killers.

I could elaborate on the misdeeds of the 754 killers on death row in this state, but I can assure you they are guilty of no more “humane” means that that of Lockett and Warner.

Presently, California is sitting on its thumbs waiting for the “approved” drugs for lethal injections. They ain’t coming folks. Drug manufacturers, mostly European, are intentionally withholding the only drugs on the approved list. Meanwhile, we pay each day for room and board for the most despicable form of humanity while allowing them to breath air that could undoubtedly go to better use.