US man executed for double murder

A man convicted of murdering two people was executed on Thursday in the US state of Georgia.

Scotty Morrow, 52, was put to death by lethal injection at 9:38 pm (0138 GMT) at a prison in Jackson, the Georgia Department of Corrections said in a statement.

Shortly after Christmas 1994, Morrow broke into his ex-girlfriend's house, where she was with two friends and her children. Morrow shot the three women, killing two of them, including his former girlfriend, in front of her five-year-old son.

He was convicted of the double murder and sentenced to death in 1999, but the decision was overturned in 2011 on the grounds that his trial defense was poor because his lawyers had failed to note he had been abused and raped as a child.

The Georgia Supreme Court then reversed that decision, confirming the original verdict from 1999.

On Wednesday, the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles dismissed a clemency request from supporters, who claimed he had become a model prisoner who was sorry for his crimes.

On Thursday, lawyers made a final appeal to the US Supreme Court, after the state Supreme Court rejected a clemency bid. He is the fifth person executed in the United States in 2019.