Update: All three inmates were executed yesterday evening as reported by News Editor Robbie Byrd with The Hunstville Item in Texas.

Three executions by lethal injection today:
Triple-murderer John Washington Hightower is scheduled to be executed today in Georgia for murders he committed almost 20 years ago. Hightower killed his wife, Dorothy Hightower and two stepdaughters, Evelyn Reaves and Sandra Reaves in July of 1987. Hightower’s clemency has been denied today by the state pardons and parole boards, as reported in this 13WMAZ news story with information from the AP. With appeals still pending, Jack Martin, Hightower’s attorney, believes his client should live because he’s “tried” to redeem himself while in prison. It has been almost 2 years since a Georgia inmate has been executed.

After having a disagreement with Doyle Windle Rains, an Oklahoma resident in 1996, Jimmy Dale Bland murdered Rains by shooting him in the back of the head. Bland, who will be put to death by lethal injection this evening, has terminal cancer and is expected to live only months. Bland’s attorney filed a motion with the U. S. Supreme Court on Sunday, stating that the execution “would violate the U. S. Constitution’s 8th amendment, which prohibits ‘cruel and unusual punishment.’” The published Reuters story indicates that if the execution is carried out, Bland would be Oklahoma’s second inmate executed this calendar year.

Patrick Brian Knight was drunk and high on drugs when he broke into his neighbors Texas home and waited for their return on August 26, 1991. After Walter and Mary Ann Werner arrived home from work, Knight forced them into their own basement, then proceeded to bound, gag and strangle the both of them the following day. As if that weren’t enough, Knight drove them 4 miles away and fatally shot the both of them execution style. As reported in this AP story, Knight has reportedly decided to tell a joke before being put to death this evening. If all goes accordingly, minus the joke, this will be the 18th inmate execution this year in Texas.