Julius Jones' lawyers ask U.S. court in Oklahoma to halt execution

The state Department of Corrections said there were no complications in that execution. The motion argues that Grant’s execution provides “compelling evidence that [Oklahoma’s] Execution Protocol and the use of midazolam, as well as the cursory consciousness checks done under the Protocol, pose a serious and substantial risk of suffering and pain to prisoners." The move comes amid an outpouring of appeals to Governor Kevin Stitt to halt Jones' execution set for later on Thursday for a 22-year-old murder in which doubts about his guilt have been raised.

Attorneys for condemned Oklahoma inmate Julius Jones filed an emergency motion in U.S. District Court in Oklahoma City on Thursday to halt his imminent execution, citing alleged defects with the three-drug lethal cocktail used by the state. The motion for an injunction to halt the execution set for 4 p.m. CST (2200 GMT) cites the state's execution by lethal injection of another inmate, John Grant, on Oct. 28 in which witnesses said he convulsed and vomited before dying. The state Department of Corrections said there were no complications in that execution.

The motion argues that Grant's execution provides "compelling evidence that [Oklahoma's] Execution Protocol and the use of midazolam, as well as the cursory consciousness checks done under the Protocol, pose a serious and substantial risk of suffering and pain to prisoners." The move comes amid an outpouring of appeals to Governor Kevin Stitt to halt Jones' execution set for later on Thursday for a 22-year-old murder in which doubts about his guilt have been raised. Advocates are urging the governor to accept a clemency recommendation of the state Pardon and Parole Board, which voted 3-1 to commute his sentence to life in prison.

Among those who have taken an interest in the case is celebrity Kim Kardashian West, who issued a series of tweets calling for Jones' sentence to be commuted. A number of evangelical leaders and a handful of Republican state lawmakers, including state Representative John Talley, also questioned Jones' guilt and urged the governor commute his sentence.

Jones, 41, who was convicted of fatally shooting insurance executive Paul Howell during a 1999 carjacking in his driveway, was among five condemned inmates who won stays of execution from a three-judge panel of the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals on Oct. 27. But the U.S. Supreme Court lifted the stays the next day, allowing the state to resume executions for the first time since 2015 by putting to death Grant, another of the five inmates, hours later.

Grant had been a plaintiff in a lawsuit set to go to trial next year challenging the three-drug protocol that ended his life as inhumane, but the state refused to postpone his execution. Jones' lawyers have cited evidence that he was home with his family when the murder occurred, which they said the jury never learned because his lawyers at the time failed to fully investigate it.

On Wednesday morning, dozens of students from each of several Oklahoma City high schools walked out of classes to demonstrate their support for clemency, local media reported.

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