RALEIGH, N.C. -- James W. Hutchins was executed by a lethal injection at Central Prison early Friday for killing three police officers in a 1979 drunken rage triggered by his daughter spiking her graduation party punch.
Hutchins was the first person executed in North Carolina since 1961 and the second put to death by lethal injection this week.
Hutchins, who got a last-minute reprieve from the state Supreme Court last Jan. 13, told his attorneys earlier in the week not to launch any further appeals or beg Gov. James B. Hunt Jr. for clemency.
His attorneys said Hutchins quit fighting his execution because 'he wants a period of peace and dignity before he has to die.'
Hunt announced Thursday afternoon that he would not grant a reprieve because he found 'no basis' on which to reverse court decisions condemning the 54-year-old laborer to death.
Hutchins received communion at 8:20 p.m. Thursday and had a final visit with his wife.
Before being taken to North Carolina's white-tiled execution chamber, Hutchins was stripped to his undershorts, strapped to a hospital gurney and medical technicians inserted two needles into his arm.
Executioners standing behind a beige curtain administered a drug that put Hutchins to sleep and followed that with a second drug that caused paralysis and death.
Sixteen people -- eight law enforcement officers, two Department of Correction officials and four reporters -- witnessed the execution.
Hutchins, who was given his choice of being executed by cyanide gas or lethal injection, became the 15th convict executed since the Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment in 1976.
Defense attorney James B. Cheshire V said late Thursday, 'We have given up on the opportunity of saving Mr. Hutchins' life and at this point are working on making it as easy as possible for him to die.
'Mr. Hutchins is very strong and he is at peace,' Cheshire said. 'He makes our job very easy.'
Hutchins spent much of the day talking with his wife and the Rev. Guy Johnson of Spindale, his minister. Johnson told reporters Hutchins was 'not worried about anything.'
'He said if they they put him to sleep Friday morning, he would wake up in heaven, walking the streets of God,' Johnson said.
Hutchins received communion from the prison chaplain at 8:20 p.m. and about 40 minutes later his wife returned to the prison for one last visit.
Johnson said Hutchins was writing a last statement because 'He has something to say to the public.'
Hunt said, 'I have received requests for action based on deeply felt arguments against the death penalty. I understand those feelings, and I respect those who hold them.
'But the murder of a law enforcement officer is not only the cold-blooded killing of a human being, it is also an assault on the fundamental rule of law in our society.'
Johnson said Hutchins, wearing green prison clothes, 'has not shed a tear.'
'He said he believes the Lord is going to give him strength and that he would be able to walk in there, take his shot and wake up in Heaven,' Johnson said.
Hutchins was convicted of the 1979 killings of three law enforcement officers in Rutherford County in western North Carolina. The shootings occurred during a rampage that began when a drunken Hutchins became enraged because he thought his daughter had used too much vodka to spike the punch for her high school graduation party.
It was in Rutherford County where two Tennessee fugitives, Ronald Freeman and James Clegg,were trapped last week after shooting a highway patrolman. Freeman was killed in a shootout and Clegg was captured hiding under a garage.
Hutchins' wife, Geneva, entered Central Prison, North Carolina's only maximum security prison, at 9:40 a.m. EST Thursday to visit him, accompanied by a member of an anti-death penalty organization.
Hutchins was put in a holding cell a few yards from the execution chamber Tuesday night and was monitored 24-hours a day by a guard sitting a few feet away.
(Hold for bulletin wire release expected about 2:15 a.m.
