After the Execution (4 page)

M
Y DAYS ON
death row came to an end at twelve thirty in the afternoon. That’s when the guards came to get me. They attached a belly chain and leg irons. I was then marched out of my cell for the last time. Never to return.

It was a strange feeling. The emotions in my chest started to build. I had to force myself to remain calm. I’d seen other guys lose it at this point. They’d had to be dragged out kicking and screaming. But I was determined to hold it together. I didn’t want to give the guards the satisfaction of seeing me crumble.

They put me into a white van that was part of a three-vehicle convoy. I was placed in a dog cage with a guard on either side. One was armed with a rifle, the other with a pistol. I was warned that if someone tried to stop the vehicle to set me free I’d be killed first. As we drove away from the Polunsky Unit I began to feel woozy and light-headed.

My date with death was only five and a half hours away. This was the last journey I’d ever make. It would take only about forty five minutes. Barely enough time to appreciate what a beautiful day it was. The sun was shining and the fields and woods of East Texas looked magnificent. But my thoughts were scattered and I found it hard to concentrate. The blood was pounding in my ears and my mind was cartwheeling. A crushing trepidation pressed in on me with cold insistence.

Our destination was Huntsville. Of the 35,000 or so residents one in three is an inmate.

We arrived just before 1.30 p.m. at the Walls. It’s the oldest prison in Texas, a large imposing building that takes up almost two blocks in the
centre of town.

There was a small group of protesters outside the entrance, members of the Texas Coalition Against the Death Penalty. Some carried banners. One banner read: ‘Stop the Killing.’ Another read: ‘This is legalized murder.’

A couple of cops were on hand to stop the protesters blocking the van and as we drove into the prison compound I felt a corkscrew turn in my gut.

This is it
, I thought.
My final destination
.

Five minutes later I was being escorted into the building through a rear door. Once inside I was strip-searched, fingerprinted, given a change of clothes and told that I would not be granted a last meal of choice. That time-honoured tradition had been stopped because in the past some inmates had abused the privilege.

Then I was led through the prison to the death house, a low,
nondescript
brick building that had been built in 1952 with inmate labour. The tiny holding cell they put me in was only about thirty feet from the death chamber. I couldn’t see inside the chamber because the door was closed, but the sight of it flooded me with apprehension.

When the cell door was slammed shut behind me I sat on the bed, clutching the only things I’d been allowed to bring with me – a photo of Marissa and the Bible she gave me.

I closed my eyes, but I couldn’t empty my mind or stop my heart from thumping out of control. I was scared. A cold sensation settled in my belly and I felt the cloying grip of nausea in my throat.

I didn’t move for almost an hour. I felt like a zombie on ketamine. My thoughts moved like thick muddy waters. My stomach started tying itself in a thousand painful knots.

Oh God how do I get through the next few hours?

Eventually the warden came to see me. A slightly cadaverous man of about fifty with graveyard looks. His fish-grey eyes were small and deep-set. He stood outside the cell and spoke to me through the bars. His voice was rough and clipped.

‘I want to explain what’s going to happen later,’ he said. ‘There’s a strict procedure that we have to follow here in the death house.’

He explained that there would be people in the victim’s witness room, people who had been close to Kimberley Crane, including her husband, the congressman.

‘Other witnesses will include a county judge and a member of the
Board of Directors of the Department of Corrections,’ he said. ‘Plus, members of the media.’

He then went on to tell me what I already knew – that I would be put to death using a cocktail of three drugs injected through an IV line into my arm in a precise sequence. The first was sodium thiopental – a fast-acting anaesthetic that would put me to sleep in seconds. The second was pancuronium bromide – a powerful muscle relaxant that would cause complete paralysis. The third – potassium chloride – was the drug that would stop my heart and thus lead to death through cardiac arrest.

‘The order of the drugs is to rapidly cause unconsciousness so that you won’t suffer,’ the warden said. ‘You will feel no pain. I can assure you of that. And the whole process will take about seven minutes.’

When the warden was finished with me he introduced the prison chaplain, a tall guy with a stoop and a shiny bald head. I noticed he was wearing brown tasselled loafers.

‘I can’t begin to imagine what you’re going through,’ he said to me. ‘But I want you to know that you are not alone here. God is with you.’

He recited a couple of prayers and then read out his own translation of Psalm 51 from The Book of Psalms, which began:

‘Have mercy on me, O God, according to your loving kindness; in your great compassion blot out my offences. Wash me thoroughly from my wickedness and cleanse me from my sin. For I know my sin is ever before me….’

He then told me he would be with me in the death chamber. His parting words were: ‘You must now make your peace with God.’

I was left alone then to stew in a cauldron of fear and regret.

The guards gathered in the corridor outside the cell just before six. The warden was there too. Their faces were expressionless, their eyes blank. This was routine to them. They were going through the motions.

The warden said, ‘It’s time to go, Lee.’

My breath suddenly roared in my ears and I felt a cold terror in my chest.

The cell door was unlocked and I was told to stand up. At first I didn’t respond because I couldn’t. It was as though I had been unplugged from reality. Then I felt a hand grip my arm and I was pulled to me feet.

‘Come quietly, son, and we won’t have to use cuffs or chains.’

They led me along the corridor to the chamber. A short, silent walk.
Tremors started to move through my limbs and my legs felt weak and rubbery.

The heavy metal door was opened. No one spoke. For just a
fleeting
moment I thought about putting up a fight and making it hard for them. But what was the point? I’d just be making it harder for myself.

As I stepped inside the chamber I felt something cold and solid form in my stomach. The image that confronted me was one that had been drilled into my consciousness over the years by countless TV
documentaries
, news reports, movies and photographs. The place where hundreds of men and women had come to die.

The chamber was smaller than I imagined it would be. It was bright and sterile, with turquoise walls and a gurney in the centre with arm supports. On one side was a small mirrored window beyond which the drugs team were waiting to do their job. On the other side curtains were drawn across the windows through which the witnesses would observe the proceedings.

A ripple of fear convulsed inside me and a wash of acid scalded my oesophagus. I felt my lips move. No sound came out. But I heard my own tortured words in my head.

Please God let it be quick. And let me be strong.

‘I need you to hop onto the gurney,’ the warden said. ‘Lay your head on the pillow and put your feet at the other end. Then stretch out your arms.’

There were five guards in the tie-down team. It took them about thirty seconds to strap me down in a crucifixion pose. The leather belts went across my chest, arms, abdomen and legs. And then a heart monitor was attached to me.

As this was happening my eyes drifted in and out of focus and I found it hard to breathe. I flinched as two IVs were then inserted, one in each arm. I’d been told that only one was necessary to carry out the execution. The other was a back-up in case the primary line failed. The tubes led through the wall into the drug room next door.

At this point the curtains across the viewing windows were pulled back. One room was empty because I’d told Emily and Zimmerman to stay away. In the other room stood a group of about half a dozen people. Reporters, I guessed, along with the friends and relatives of Kimberley Crane. One of them I recognized instantly.

Gideon Crane.

His hair was greyer now and he had lost weight. He was wearing
a dark suit and a bright red tie. We locked eyes. His were wide and hostile. I tried to hold his stare and not to blink, but I found it impossible to focus on even that one small task.

‘Would you like to make a final statement?’ the warden said.

I turned away from Crane but I could still feel the heat from his eyes on me. A microphone was suspended from the ceiling above the gurney. The warden lowered it towards my face. I hesitated for a weighty second before I found my voice.

‘I’m innocent,’ I said. ‘I did not kill Kimberley Crane.’

No one responded, but I didn’t expect them to. Instead I heard the chaplain start to read out a prayer. At the same time the warden must have given the signal because the lethal drugs started to flow through the tube and into my veins.

In seconds my lungs felt like they were being squeezed shut. A cold sweat broke out on my forehead. I stared at the ceiling as my breathing became more and more laboured.

Then I felt myself letting go.

Just before the darkness took me I heard myself call out Marissa’s name.

G
IDEON
C
RANE FELT
a cold numbness envelop him as he watched Lee Jordan die. The guy’s body shook a little, his lips seemed to turn blue, and finally his chest stopped moving.

‘Oh, my God,’ Pauline said in a hushed tone, as she grabbed his arm and buried her face against his shoulder.

Crane continued to stare into the death chamber, his heart
pounding
, his mouth dry. It’s over, he thought. At long fucking last.

Pauline squeezed his hand. He felt a shiver grab hold of his spine. Almost ten years to the day after Lee Jordan invaded his home with his accomplice, he was dead. Thank God.

The congressman watched as a suited physician entered the chamber. He checked the heart monitor, then Jordan’s pulse and eyes. He then turned to the warden and pronounced that Jordan was no longer alive. Time of death was recorded as fifteen minutes past six.

As Crane walked out of the viewing room with the other witnesses he could feel a rush of adrenaline circulating through his system.

‘Are you all right, Gideon?’ Pauline asked him as they stepped outside the death house.

He came to a stop and filled his lungs with heavy draughts of sweet, cool air.

‘I’m fine,’ he said. ‘What about you?’

‘I’m relieved it’s over,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t an easy thing to watch.’

He gave her arm a squeeze. ‘It was brave of you to come.’

A TV crew and a couple of reporters were waiting outside to get his reaction. He was careful what he said and made a point of not looking too pleased.

‘I’m just glad that after ten years I can put this terrible ordeal behind
me,’ he told them. ‘I can at last focus on the future, especially the Presidential nomination race. Lee Jordan can now answer to God for what he did to my darling wife.’

M
ARISSA IS WAITING
for me. She’s standing in the front doorway of a small, timber-frame house that has been painted a brilliant white. When she sees me she beams a smile and waves.

My heart leaps and I start to run towards her. She looks beautiful in a lilac-blue summer dress, her long blonde hair framing a face that has not aged in seven years.

But she doesn’t wait for me to reach her. Instead she steps backwards into the house and closes the door behind her. I try to pick up speed, but realize that I’m not getting any closer. It’s like I’m running on a treadmill.

Then I see a dark plume of smoke escaping from an open window on the ground floor. Half a second later the smoke turns into a bright orange flame that seizes the timber framework and spreads with lightning speed. I hear my wife scream. I feel the fierce heat of the fire on my face as the flames quickly engulf the entire building.

And then suddenly I wake up. Just as I always do when my recurring nightmare reaches this point.

‘Welcome back from the dead, Lee.’

A man’s voice. One I don’t recognize. It’s coming from somewhere in the darkness. I move towards it. But it’s slow going. Like climbing up a greasy wall out of a deep hole in the ground.

‘You’re not dreaming, Lee. You really are alive.’

The voice again. Soft. Almost a whisper. Burred with a southern drawl. My eyes spring open. Everything’s a blur. Like staring into a mist. I’m aware of an ache in my head and a soft rattle in my chest as I breathe.

The mist clears. I’m now staring up at a ceiling that’s off-white and flat. A flicker of movement draws my eyes to the left. I see a man’s face. He’s
unfamiliar. A square jaw and thin mouth. Brown hair parted with surgical precision. Eyes bloodshot and glassy, with heavy pouches beneath them.

‘It’s a hell of a thing to absorb, Lee,’ the man says. ‘So take it slowly. And try not to overreact.’

I’m drifting in and out of awareness. Not sure what this stranger is telling me. I feel sick. The pounding in my head is growing more intense.

And then an image flashes in my mind, swirling into a mental hologram. A room with turquoise walls and windows on either side. People staring at me through the glass. There’s a gurney in the centre of the room and I see myself strapped on top of it, my arms outstretched as though I’m on a cross.

Holy crap.

It all comes back to me then in a great savage flood of memory that leaves me breathless.

The execution chamber, where they gave me a lethal injection. I can even remember floating into oblivion as the drugs shut down my mind and body.

So why am I still breathing?

‘My name is Aaron Vance,’ the man says, holding up an ID badge. ‘I’m a Special Agent in Charge with the FBI. I’m here to tell you that you’ve been given a second chance at life.’