Posted on Wed, Sep. 17, 2008

By MICHAEL GRACZYK
Associated Press Writer

HUNTSVILLE, Texas -- Widespread power shortages in the Huntsville area were not affecting the scheduled execution of a Texas prisoner condemned for killing an elderly woman 10 years ago.

Former auto mechanic and laborer William Murray, 39, was set to die Wednesday evening. The execution would be the ninth this year in the nation's most active capital punishment state.

The Huntsville Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, where lethal injections are carried out, had power, agency spokeswoman Michelle Lyons said.

Murray's appeals were exhausted and the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles uanimously rejected a clemency request filed by his attorney, J. Stephen Bush, who acknowledged the attempt was "a very long shot."

Read the entire article HERE.