ATMORE, Ala. (AP) — A man convicted in the 2004 shooting deaths of three police officers in which another man pulled the trigger was executed in Alabama on Thursday.
Authorities said 43-year-old Nathaniel Woods was pronounced dead at 9:01 p.m. CST after a lethal injection at the state prison in Atmore.
This inmate’s execution came shortly after the U.S. Supreme Court rejected his 11th-hour appeals.
Woods was convicted of capital murder in the deaths of the Birmingham officers.
Though evidence showed his convicted co-defendant did the shooting, prosecutors said Woods was an accomplice and deserved to die for the killings.
"Nathaniel Woods is 100% innocent," Kerry Spencer, the confessed gunman also on death row, wrote in an open letter ahead of Woods' planned execution, adding, "I pray that my words don't fall on blind eyes or deaf ears. Don't allow another innocent man [to] be executed."
Supporters including Martin Luther King III argued that executing Woods was unjust.
No execution date has been set for Woods' convicted co-defendant, Kerry Spencer.
