Reported by: Jessica Noll
Web produced by: Jessica Noll
Marco Allen Chapman's wish to be put to death for his crimes was granted Friday when he was executed by lethal injection.
Chapman, who was sentenced to death Dec. 14, 2004, died at 7:34 p.m. CST Friday. The 37-year-old confessed child-killer was put to death by lethal injection, leaving 36 inmates -- among them one woman -- on Kentucky's Death Row.
The execution was the first since Eddie Lee Harper was executed by lethal injection in 1999.
Convicted murderer Ralph Baze was scheduled for execution in 2007. However, the Kentucky Supreme Court issued a stay of execution and the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear his appeal.
Friday's execution marked the 165th for the Kentucky State Penitentiary in Eddyville, Ky., which opened in 1886.
In 1911 the prison carried out death sentences by electrocution. Through 1997, 163 inmates were executed in the electric chair. In 1998 Kentucky changed the law to mandate lethal injection as the primary means to execute an inmate on death row.
According to the Department of Corrections, electrocution can still be used for execution if an inmate who was sentenced before the law was changed chooses it. Therefore, the electric chair is still at the penitentiary.
For lethal injections a deadly cocktail is used that includes sodium thiopental which causes the inmate to lose consciousness and lose control of involuntary movements; pancuronium bromide, a sedative which relaxes the inmate; and finally potassium chloride, which stops the heart, ultimately causing death.
About The Kentucky State Penitentiary:
Population: 856
Staff: 348
White Inmates: 65 percent
Black Inmates: 34 percent
Other Inmates: 1 percent
Annual Cost Per Inmate: $24,000
Daily Cost Per Inmate: $65
Information for fact box courtesy of Dept. of Corrections
