(Georgia Department of Corrections via AP)
Nearly twenty years after Gregory Paul Lawler shot and killed an Atlanta police officer and wounded another, the state of Georgia is preparing to execute him.
Lawler and his girlfriend were drinking at a bar in October 1997. They left the bar and had some sort of altercation in a parking lot, according to court records. Officers John Sowa and Patricia Cocciolone approached the couple, and Lawler ran home.
The two police officers escorted Lawler's girlfriend home, where they again encountered Lawler.
"Get the fuck away from my door," Lawler said, according to court records. After his girlfriend entered the apartment, Lawler tried to shut the door on the officers — but Sowa put his hand up to stop the door.
Lawler grabbed an AR-15 rifle he had placed next to the door and fired penetrator bullets that could pierce the bullet-proof vests the officers were wearing. He instantly killed Sowa and wounded Cocciolone.
After a six-hour stand-off, a hostage negotiator convinced Lawler to surrender.
Lawler's attorneys asked the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles to grant clemency, arguing that a new diagnosis of an autism spectrum disorder helps to explain Lawler's erratic behavior and testimony. But on Tuesday, the board denied the request.
Lawler's attorneys have told BuzzFeed News they currently are asking state courts to intervene as well.
Provided they or federal courts do not step in, this will be Georgia's seventh execution this year — tying Texas. No other state has carried out multiple executions this year.
The state uses a single drug called pentobarbital supplied by an anonymous compounding pharmacy that mixes the drug.
Source BuzzFeed - Politics http://ift.tt/2dqLxbd
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