Sept. 16 (UPI) — Texas is set to execute LeJames Norman on Wednesday night, 21 years after he killed three people in an Edna, Texas, home.
Norman, 19 at the time, and Ker’sean Olajuwa Ramey broke into the home of their neighbor in 2005 intending to steal cocaine, according to court records, The Texas Tribune reported. While there, they got into a fight with the occupants of the home, and killed Celso Lopez, 38; Tiffani Peacock, 18; and Sam Roberts, 24.
Norman has shown remorse for the killings. His attorneys have argued that he had a troubled childhood that led him to murders, and that he deserves mercy, USA Today reported. He grew up in and out of homeless shelters and was physically abused by his parents. When Norman was young, a police officer shot and killed his father, which court records say “greatly affected Norman.”
Tabatha Munnerlyn Hastings, Peacock’s sister, told USA Today that “Tiffani was so much more than the tragedy that took her life.”
“She was my sister, and she was a light to the people who knew and loved her,” Hastings said. “She was only 18 years old. Her whole life was still ahead of her. She had dreams, hopes, plans, and so much more life left to live.”
After the murders, Norman fled to Mexico but was stopped by Border Patrol agents when he re-entered the United States. He then cooperated with police and testified against Ramey. Norman pleaded guilty at his trial in 2008 and was sentenced to death. He has since filed several appeals, including one on Monday to the U.S. Supreme Court, alleging that prosecutors misrepresented facts.
Norman also sued the state in August with another death row inmate John Rubio asking a Travis County district judge to block the state’s use of pentobarbital, which it uses for lethal injections. He argued that Texas’s supply of the drug was either expired or created at a compounding facility, and therefore unreliable.
The Texas Department of Criminal Justice tested its supply of the drug for potency and will extend its use date if it determines it will work effectively, The Tribune said. Some critics have called this method unreliable and unsafe.
A Travis County district judge had barred the use of pentobarbital before the 2023 execution of Robert Fratta over concerns about the practice, but that ruling was overturned on appeal and Fratta’s execution went forward.
If Norman’s execution happens, it will be the fifth in the state this year. Ramey is scheduled to be executed on Sept. 23, and there are three more set for the rest of the year. Both will be executed by lethal injection.
Another execution, scheduled for just an hour before Norman’s, was stayed in Georgia. Stacey Humphries was scheduled to be executed by lethal injection at 7 p.m. EDT at the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison in Jackson, Ga.
But Cobb County Superior Court Judge Tyler J. Browning stayed the execution after attorneys argued that Humphries qualifies for resentencing under Georgia’s 2025 Survivor Justice Act. Medical evaluations showed that Humphries had received severe physical, emotional and sexual abuse during his childhood.
In 2003, Hastings robbed and killed Lori Brown, 21, and Cyndi Williams, 33, at a model home in an Atlanta suburb.