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Russell Bucklew Executed For 1996 Murder After Missouri's Governor Says No To Clemency

Russell Bucklew died Tuesday after being sentenced to death in 1997.
Missouri Department of Corrections
Russell Bucklew died Tuesday after being sentenced to death in 1997.

Missouri executed its first prisoner since 2017 on Tuesday night. Despite the man’s rare medical condition, no complications were reported. 

Russell Bucklew had been on death row since 1997 for killing a man in Cape Girardeau County. His lawyers and activists had argued for clemency more than once, saying Bucklew’s cavernous hemangioma could cause him to choke on his own blood during the lethal injection of the drug pentobarbital

Roughly 70,000 people signed a petition asking Gov. Mike Parson to stop the execution. But Parson declined to grant clemency Tuesday morning. 

It was Bucklew’s last hope after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in April that the lethal injection method wasn’t “cruel and unusual” punishment. 

Russell Bucklew died Tuesday after being sentenced to death in 1997.
Credit Missouri Department of Corrections
Russell Bucklew died Tuesday after being sentenced to death in 1997.

In an interview before the execution, Bucklew's lawyer Jeremy Weis said the governor’s decision was a disappointment. 

“I believe very strongly that Rusty was and is worthy of Governor Parson’s mercy,” Weis said. “I think he’s demonstrated that over the past 23 years that he’s remorseful for his terrible actions in March of 1996.” 

In March 1996, Bucklew entered a trailer where Michael Sanders lived with Bucklew’s ex-girlfriend, Stephanie Ray. Bucklew shot Sanders, tried to shoot a fleeing child and then abducted and raped Ray. He later wounded a state trooper in a shootout before he was captured.

Since 2000, Missouri has executed 47 people. Currently, 22 people in the Missouri prison system have death sentences, according to Department of Corrections spokeswoman Karen Pojmann, but no other executions have been scheduled. 

Aviva Okeson-Haberman is the Missouri government and politics reporter at KCUR 89.3. Follow her on Twitter: @avivaokeson.

Copyright 2020 KCUR 89.3. To see more, visit .

When Aviva first got into radio reporting, she didn’t expect to ride on the back of a Harley. But she’ll do just about anything to get good nat sounds. Aviva has profiled a biker who is still riding after losing his right arm and leg in a crash more than a decade ago, talked to prisoners about delivering end-of-life care in the prison’s hospice care unit and crisscrossed Mid-Missouri interviewing caregivers about life caring for someone with autism. Her investigation into Missouri’s elder abuse hotline led to an investigation by the state’s attorney general. As KCUR’s Missouri government and state politics reporter, Aviva focuses on turning complicated policy and political jargon into driveway moments.