The state of Missouri on Tuesday executed Brian Dorsey for the 2006 murders of his cousin, Sarah Bonnie, and her husband, Benjamin Bonnie, after an effort to have his life spared failed in recent days.
Dorsey’s time of death was recorded as 6:11 p.m, the Missouri Department of Corrections said in a news release. The method of execution was lethal injection, Karen Pojmann, a spokesperson for the department, said at a news conference, adding it “went smoothly, no problems.”
The execution of Dorsey, 52, occurred hours after the US Supreme Court declined to intervene and about a day after Missouri’s Republican governor denied clemency, rejecting the inmate’s petition – backed by more than 70 correctional officers and others – for a commutation of his sentence to life in prison.
Dorsey and his attorneys cited his remorse, his rehabilitation while behind bars and his representation at trial by attorneys who allegedly had a “financial conflict of interest” as reasons he should not be put to death. But those arguments were insufficient to convince Gov. Mike Parson, who said in a statement carrying out Dorsey’s sentence “would deliver justice and provide closure.”
Execution sentences have more legal process than life sentences (appeals, etc), where life sentences usually get a basic appeals process unless new evidence is found and you can convince someone to take your case and petition on your behalf, where capital cases have mandatory appeals and often involve higher courts’ and government officials’ time. Add to that the fact that it often takes literal decades from conviction to execution and death row having often higher staffing requirements including (ironically) a suicide watch, the extra costs add up.
So basically you have someone effectively serving a life sentence, plus extra court costs, plus the time it takes for the governor to consider your clemency appeal (even it if it only a few minutes), plus extra staffing, plus the cost of the execution itself.