Inmate’s Last Meal Request Highlights Mental Decline Before Controversial Execution

Wesley Ira Purkey’s execution grabbed widespread attention in 2020. The 68-year-old Kansas native was sentenced to death in 2004 for the r— and murder of a teenage girl, Jennifer Long, and the murder of an elderly woman, Mary Ruth Bales.

However, Purkey’s attorney and supporters opposed his execution, stating that he was suffering from dementia, Alzheimer’s disease, brain damage, and schizophrenia. Prison officials who offered him a last meal later spoke about his mental condition, revealing that he asked them to save a pecan pie for later, not realizing he had no ‘later.’

Experts also highlighted that while death penalties with lethal injection are supposed to be painless, Purkey suffered an excruciating experience due to the sudden accumulation of fluid in his lungs.

Following Purkey’s execution, the Death Penalty Information Center released his autopsy report, which stated he suffered ‘frothy pulmonary oedema in trachea and main stem bronchi’ and ‘severe bilateral acute pulmonary oedema’ at the time of his death.

In an interview with the Daily Mail, medical expert Dr Gail Van Norman stated that the condition means Purkey was having difficulty breathing due to the accumulation of fluid in both lungs. The doctor described the experience as similar to drowning, and said it is among the worst feelings known to humans.

“It is a virtual medical certainty, that most, if not all, prisoners will experience excruciating suffering, including sensations of drowning and suffocation from [the lethal injection drug] pentobarbital,” Van Norman said.

Meanwhile, Purkey’s attorney, Rebecca E. Woodman, argued that his execution defied the law, which bars carrying out a death sentence if a person’s mental illness prevents them from understanding why they are being punished. Woodman said her client was so cognitively impaired that he no longer recognized his loved ones.

Purkey believed that the government was conspiring against him, and the prison officials were mixing poison in his food. The request to keep the pecan pie for later further gave an insight into his cognitive impairment.

Citing his mental condition, Woodman filed an appeal to suspend his execution. A federal district judge in Washington, D.C. issued an injunction in his favor, but the Supreme Court overturned the decision.

Woodman accused the government of withholding information about Purkey’s progressing dementia from the courts. On July 16, 2020, Purkey was given a lethal injection in a federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana.

Purkey was sentenced to death for the stabbing and killing of 16-year-old Long in 1998. Long disappeared after school in January of that year. It was later revealed that Purkey lured her into his car and took her to his home.

He then r—-- her and stabbed her multiple times, before dismembering her body and burning it in a fireplace. The same year, he beat and killed 80-year-old Bales with a claw hammer. As he received the lethal injection, he apologized to Long’s family by saying, “I deeply regret the pain and suffering I caused to Jennifer's family. I am deeply sorry.”

“I deeply regret the pain I caused to my daughter, who I love so very much. This sanitised murder really does not serve no purpose whatsoever,” he said in his final words.