News Staff Report
A condemned Alabama inmate whose death warrant expired minutes before the U.S. Supreme Court voted to let his execution proceed in April, is scheduled to die by lethal injection this Thursday, May 30, at Holman Correctional Facility near Atmore.
The execution of 46-year-old Christopher Lee Price, convicted in 1993 of the 1991 fatal slashing of a Fayette County preacher and businessman, is set for 6 p.m. Price was initially set to die on April 11.
Gov. Kay Ivey issued a statement expressing her disappointment in the wake of the court’s failure to act in a timely manner.
“This evening, the state of Alabama witnessed a miscarriage of justice,” Ivey said when Price’s life was spared at the last minute.
According to court documents, a jury found Price guilty of using a sword to mortally wound Bill Lynn, a minister who also owned and operated an auto parts store in the Bazemore community. Price and at least two accomplices broke into Lynn’s home on Dec. 22, 1991 and robbed him and his wife, who was injured but lived to testify against the robber-assailants.
Price was arrested in Chattanooga, Tenn. just a few days later and reportedly admitted his role in the robbery. He eventually confessed to the slaying after maintaining at first that one of his accomplices actually committed the murder.
Price and his attorneys have argued that his conviction should be overturned, that Price’s confession shouldn’t have been used against him because he wasn’t properly Mirandized prior to admitting to the murder. They also argued that Alabama’s lethal injection executions were rife with mistakes that caused convicts to suffer needlessly.
The Supreme Court voted 5-4 to let the execution commence. The high court’s majority, in vacating the lower court’s stay, sided with the state and said Price had waited too late to bring his challenge.