More Candidates for Lethal Injection
The little girl’s body discovered by a fisherman a few weeks ago was positively identified as that of 
2-year-old Riley Ann Sawyers. She had lived with her mother, father and grandparents in Ohio up until June of this year. It was in June that her mother decided to run off to Texas and marry a man she had met on the Internet. Riley did not make it alive to see August.
The end of ‘Baby Grace’s’ short life was finally revealed in graphic detail by her mother to investigators.
“According to court documents, the mother of 2-year-old Riley Ann Sawyers told police she and her husband beat the girl with two leather belts and held her head underwater in a bathtub in July. Riley’s stepfather then threw her across the room, slamming her head onto a tile floor.
Kimberly Dawn Trenor said in her statement to police that the couple bought the plastic bin (at Walmart) and placed her daughter’s body inside it that evening. The bin stayed hidden in a storage shed for one to two months, until the couple traveled 75 miles south from their home in the Houston suburb of Spring to Galveston Bay, where the body was dumped.”
Of course the whole story will change when Kimberly and husband Royce Clyde Ziegler II make their pleas in court. They will plead not guilty to the charges as is their right and force the justice system to prove their case. Unfortunately, when and if the charges are proven true and the sentences are handed down that will not be the end of their rights. If one or both of the suspects are sentenced to death there will be years of appeals.
Currently at issue regarding the death penalty is the issue of whether or not death by lethal injection should be considered cruel and unusual punishment. The supposed concern is there has been several instances since death by lethal injection was introduced that the person being executed experienced pain. There is no way of knowing for sure if the executed convicts experienced pain or not because the dead don’t talk. Frankly, I don’t care if they do in fact experience a painful death. Most executed convicts were found guilty of some of the most cruel and heinous murders and they did not care about the discomfort of their victims at the time of the crime.
Understand one thing as far as I am concerned, I am in no way under the impression that the death penalty in any way shape or form serves as a deterrent to crime. I believe the death penalty should serve two purposes. The first being retribution for the victim and the victim’s family members. Secondly, the death penalty should serve to remove even the remotest possibility that these murderers will ever be released back into society.
What are my thoughts on the possibility of an innocent person being executed you might ask. There is a real possibility that some day a person will be executed who is indeed guilty - it may have already happened. Advances in forensics should reduce the possibilities of convicting an innocent person and for those already on death row - well - the innocence projects are there to help them.
In the case of Kimberly Trenor and Royce Clyde Ziegler II, we already know from the confession that they both tortured that poor little girl to death, calmly went out and purchased a plastic storage box for her coffin, and finally threw her into the water like so much garbage.
Would I have sympathy for either one of these people if they experienced the pain of the technicians having to poke them more than once to find a vein? No.
Death by lethal injection usually involves administering via a vein 3 drugs. The first drug is designed to produce unconsciousness, the second produces paralysis, and the third produces a heart attack.
Would I feel bad if a convicted murderer of a child did not quite go under the influence of the first drug administered and then was possibly aware that they were paralyzed after the second drug was administered? No. Would I feel bad if the convicted child murderer felt the pain of the heart attack? No.
The reasons why I would not feel bad if the convicted child murderer suffered their punishment is simple. They did not feel empathy for their victim. I hope Kimberly Trenor and Royce Clyde Ziegler, II are convicted of murder and sentenced to death and I hope they suffer the way they made Riley suffer.
Sources:
MSNBC: Police: Confession Reveals Child’s Last Moments
Wikipedia: Lethal Injection
The Galveston County Daily News: Child was Tortured and Beaten Records Claim
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