Kevin Underwood's execution date is on 12/19/2024. Pray there is no stay.
From his appeal
He stated he was not a pedophile but felt a child would be easier to kill.
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A clemency hearing for a child killer will be held as planned Monday.
U.S. District Judge Charles B. Goodwin on Sunday denied a request from Kevin Ray Underwood’s attorneys that a full five-member Pardon and Parole Board hear his request for clemency or issue an execution stay.
Underwood’s original clemency hearing was set for Dec. 4, but was canceled after two Pardon and Parole Board members resigned.
After a protest from Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond, a new hearing was set for Monday.
Gov. Kevin Stitt late Friday announced he had appointed Tulsa attorney Susan H. Stava to replace H. Calvin Prince III, one of the two who resigned, bringing the board’s contingent to four out of five members.
Underwood is set to die Dec. 19 by lethal injection at Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester
He was convicted for the 2006 suffocation of Jamie Rose Bolin, 10. Her partially decapitated body was found in a plastic tub in his Purcell apartment.
He had planned to rape and cannibalize her body, according to public documents.
A federal court hearing was held Friday on his request for the full board to hear his clemency request or be granted a stay of execution, but Goodwin did not rule at that time.
Underwood’s attorneys said he had a better probability of obtaining the three necessary votes with five board members as opposed to fewer. He also argued that one of his attorneys and a mental health expert could not be there physically. His metal health expert, however, could testify by video conference.
A “deeply evil” Oklahoma inmate facing execution for torturing and killing a little girl as part of a cannibalistic fantasy admitted he deserves to die during a hearing in which a final clemency plea was shot down.
Kevin Ray Underwood, 44, made the jarring statement in front of the state’s Pardon and Parole Board, which voted unanimously against his clemency on Friday more than a decade after he was convicted of murdering 10-year-old Jamie Rose Bolin.
“I recognize that although I do not want to die … I deserve to for what I did,” he said over video from prison on Friday, according to the Oklahoman. “And if my death could … change what I did, I would gladly die.”
Underwood also apologized to the victim’s family and his own family.
“I can’t believe I did those things,” he continued.
“The person I was in the weeks leading up to that event is not who I am now.”
Attorney General Gentner Drummond applauded the board voting to deny clemency “for this deeply evil monster and ensured that justice will be delivered for Jamie Rose Bolin.”
An Oklahoma man who killed a 10-year-old girl in a cannibalistic fantasy died by lethal injection Thursday in the nation’s 25th and final execution of the year.
Kevin Ray Underwood was pronounced dead at 10:14 a.m. at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester. It was Oklahoma’s fourth execution of the year, and it took place on Underwood’s 45th birthday.
Strapped to a gurney inside the death chamber on Thursday, Underwood apologized to Jamie’s family and to his own family “for all the terrible things I did.”
“The decision to execute me on my birthday and six days before Christmas was a needlessly cruel thing to do to my family,” Underwood said, “but I’m very sorry for what I did and I wish I could take it back.”
Underwood looked over to members of his legal team and his family, including his mother, as the execution began at 10:04 a.m.. His breathing hitched slightly and his eyes closed a few minutes later. A doctor entered the execution chamber at 10:09 a.m., shook him a few times and declared him unconscious. He was pronounced dead five minutes later.
Jamie’s sister, Lori Pate, who was among several relatives who witnessed the execution, thanked prosecutors for helping guide her family through the nearly 18-year process from Jamie’s death to Underwood’s execution.
“This doesn’t bring our Jamie back but it does allow the space in our hearts to focus on her and allow the healing process to begin,” Pate said.
During a hearing last week, three members of the state’s Pardon and Parole Board unanimously voted against recommending clemency.
Underwood’s attorneys had argued that he deserved to be spared the death penalty because of his long history of abuse and serious mental health issues that included autism, obsessive-compulsive disorder, bipolar and panic disorders, post-traumatic stress disorder, schizotypal personality disorder and various deviant sexual paraphilias.
Prosecutors argued that many people suffer from mental illness, but that doesn’t justify harming children.