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| James Phillips, whose wife Mary was raped and murdered in 1996 by Jack Jones, says he has no qualms about his execution. |
THE husband of the woman raped and murdered by Jack Jones, one of the two men put to death at an Arkansas prison on Monday, has said he has no qualms about the execution and has hit out at those who called for mercy.
In a dignified, but gut wrenching interview, James Phillips described the night his wife Mary was killed saying he didn’t care if Jones suffered “because my wife suffered big time”.
In 1996 Jones was sentenced to death for the rape and murder of Mary and attempting to murder her 11-year-old daughter.
The sentence was carried out at 7.20pm on Monday (US time), after a combination of lethal drugs was pumped into Jones at the Cummins Unit in the Arkansas Department of Correction’s death chamber in the state’s south east.
The state is in the midst of a rush on executions as its store of lethal injection drugs nears expiry at the end of the month.
The last words of Jones were: “I’m sorry.”
“I hope over time you can learn who I really am and I am not a monster,” he said in the roughly two-minute statement.
Following Jones’s execution, lawyers for Williams claimed officials spent 45 minutes trying to place an IV line in Jones’s neck before placing it elsewhere.
In a last-minute appeal, they said Jones was still conscious, moving his lips and “gulping for air” after being administered with the sedative midazolam that is supposed to render inmates unconscious, according to local media reports.
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| Jack Harold Jones (L) was one of two death row inmates killed on Monday. Marcel W. Williams (R) was killed a few hours later. |
“It don’t matter if they suffered a little bit as far as I’m concerned because my wife suffered big time,” Mr Phillips told the BBC.
He described the night his wife went missing. He was away on a business trip 500 miles (800 kms) away. His son had called him saying Mary hadn’t returned home. After asking him to search to see if her car had broken down close to home, Mr Phillips told his son to stay indoors and wait for his mum to return.
“She’ll be home in a while,” he said.
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Mary Phillips was raped and killed by Jack Jones in 1996.Source:Supplied
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“So I packed up my bags at the hotel, called my supervisor [and] drove 500 miles knowing nothing that happened.”
The full horror of what his wife went through still pains Mr Phillips.
Mary was at work with their daughter Lacy when they were set upon by Jones. The 11-year-old was choked and beaten until she passed out. Then Jones turned his attention to Mary.
“She was sexually abused in every way possible,” said Mr Phillips.
“As she was suffering he took a cord of a coffee pot and strangled her and I don’t know how much meaner a man can get to do something like that, ” he told the BBC.
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| Phillips said he isn’t moved by anti death penalty protesters. |
“I know a lot of people forgiven him and all that kind of stuff. They can protest all they want, it doesn’t matter.”
Mr Phillips said he had little sympathy for those who asked for Jones’ punishment to be lessened.
“Did they marry their high school sweetheart? What would they do, how would they feel if it happened to their family?
“Would they still be defending someone like this? I don’t think they would.”
Arkansas’ execution schedule, to beat the best before dates on its stocks of drugs continues apace. There’s another execution scheduled for Thursday.
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