Grieving relatives' relief as McVeigh is executed
There was relief but little joy tonight in the US as the country came to terms with the execution of Timothy McVeigh, its worst-ever mass murderer.
McVeigh, who killed 168 people, 19 of them children, when he bombed the Alfred P Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City, died by lethal injection at Terre Haute prison in Indiana.
Tonight his death was described as ‘‘an act not of vengeance but of justice’’ by President George W Bush, while there was a mixture of tears, relief and emotional exhaustion for the relatives of his victims and the survivors of the bombing.
A total of 242 of the survivors and victims’ relatives watched the execution, 10 of them in a room looking on to the green tile-lined execution chamber.
They watched as McVeigh died in silence, his eyes staring at the camera above him which relayed his image to the 232 watching via closed circuit TV in Oklahoma City, where on April 19, 1995, he had brought death and destruction on a scale never before seen in the United States.
The witnesses hugged each other after seeing McVeigh take his last breath just four minutes after he was injected with the first of the cocktail of three drugs used to kill him.
Described as thin and aged, he went to his death ‘‘calmly and co-operatively’’, sitting willingly on the table where he was to die before being restrained and having an intravenous tube inserted in his right leg, prison warden Harley Lappin said.
Other prisoners on death row had told a website he had been starving himself to look like ‘‘a concentration camp victim’’ in his autopsy pictures.
His death had been scheduled for 7am local time (1pm Irish time) but it was delayed slightly by a technical hitch with the video link-up to Oklahoma City.
Foregoing his right to speak his last words, McVeigh instead issued a written statement, reciting Invictus, a 19th century poem which ends: ‘‘I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.’’
Shortly before 7.10am the curtains separating the death chamber from the three witness rooms - one for his witnesses, one for 10 members of the media and one for the victims’ relatives and survivors - were drawn back.
As each curtain drew back, McVeigh moved his head to make eye contact with the people behind the glass.
Paul Howell, 64, whose daughter died in the bombing, said: ‘‘He turned his head to us for about a second or two.
‘‘What I was hoping for was that we could see some kind of ‘I am sorry’. We didn’t get any from his face.’’
In Oklahoma, the witnesses sat in silence as they saw the image of McVeigh’s face.
Karen Jones, whose two grandsons were among the children killed, said: ‘‘I think I did see the face of evil today.’’
Dan McKinney, who lost his wife Gail in the atrocity, said: ‘‘I really felt that he was feeling fear for the first time. He looked left, straight ahead, and right like he was searching for something.’’
Shari Sawyer, whose mother was killed, said: ‘‘It was hard to keep our eyes on the screen. I know he was looking at us.’’
Others saw defiance in his eyes but at 7.14am he was pronounced dead.
In Oklahoma, there was a collective sigh of relief for those watching.
Within half an hour, Harley Lappin broke the silence hanging over the prison and hanging over America with simple words. ‘‘The court order to execute inmate Timothy James McVeigh has been fulfilled,’’ he said.
‘‘He was pronounced dead at 7.14am central daylight time.’’
And while there was relief at the death of a man who has haunted their waking and sleeping moments for six years, many of those left bereaved by McVeigh said today was only a milestone in a life of mourning.
Anthony Scott, who survived the blast but saw eight colleagues killed, said: ‘‘We cannot bring back the lives that we lost. One life for 168.’’
President Bush summed up a national mood when he said: ‘‘For the survivors of the crime, and for the families of the dead, the pain goes on. Final punishment of the guilty cannot alone bring peace for the innocent.’’
Many chose not to watch the execution, instead gathering at the memorial to their loved ones on the site of McVeigh’s atrocity, where they held a 168-minute silence - one minute for each of the dead.
In the sunshine, they hugged, prayed, laid flowers and remembered the people who died and the more than 800 who were injured.
Outside the prison, in the same sunshine, McVeigh’s lawyer Robert Nigh said he had tried to get the bomber to apologise but could not. Mr Nigh was one of his witnesses, with none of his family watching the imposition of the death penalty.
He called for an end to the death penalty, saying: ‘‘We have made killing part of the healing process.’’
But for those left in mourning by the bombing and who had watched McVeigh die, there were no regrets.
Grayson Jones, whose son died, said: ‘‘I don’t think he got what he deserved but we will have to settle with that.’’
Martha Ridley, who lost her daughter, said: ‘‘It is definitely time for Mr McVeigh to go.
‘‘And the only thing I’m going to say after that is ‘Good, I’m glad he’s gone’.’’
