A South Carolina man who has been considering death on death row, opting for a deadly injection on Friday, but another inmate appears to have continued before the bullet apparently missed his heart.
Stephen Stanko's lawyer told him that when a deadly pentagonal dose was injected into the prisoner's vein, the deadly injection would flood and the lungs would flood into the lungs.
Medical experts hired by the state say the drugs make inmates unconscious before they feel pain, but experts hired by inmates say the haste of fluid can feel drowning.
The U.S. Supreme Court denied the delay in Wednesday's June 13 execution so he could learn more about his options.
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A South Carolina man who has been considering death on death row, opting for a deadly injection on Friday, but another inmate appears to have continued before the bullet apparently missed his heart. (South Carolina Department of Corrections through AP)
In addition to the deadly injection and shooting squad, the convicted double murderer also has the option of an electric chair.
The autopsy of Mikal Mahdi, the killer of the off-duty policeman who was fired in April, showed that prisoners could suffer for up to a minute, longer than expected 15 seconds, and 15 seconds of unconsciousness in all bullets, his heart missed his heart, his lawyer said.
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Mikal Mahdi executes in April (South Carolina Department of Corrections through AP)
Stanko was sentenced to death twice for two separate murders.
In April 2006, Stanko, 57, beat and strangled her girlfriend Laura Ling, and raped her teenage daughter and slit her throat. The daughter survived the trial and testified.
Hours after the murder, he went to the home of his 74-year-old friend Henry Turner, and shot him and stole the truck.
Defense attorney Gerald Kelly agreed with defendant Stephen Stanko during a pretrial hearing in Georgetown County Court in Georgetown, South Carolina on July 31, 2006. (AP Photo/Tom Murray, Pool, File)
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South Carolina resumed executions in September after 13 years of killing the drug use, and the pharmacies refused to offer more unless a new confidentiality law protects its privacy.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.