The U.S. government executed Orlando Hall on Thursday night for his role in the brutal murder, rape, and kidnapping of a 16-year-old Texas girl, Lisa René, whose brothers had crossed Hall in a drug deal. He was pronounced dead at 11:47 p.m. after being given a lethal injection cocktail at the federal penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana. It was the eighth federal execution carried out this year, after Attorney General William Barr lifted a two-decade pause on federal capital punishment.
U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan had ordered a halt on Hall's execution while the court's considered his legal challenges, including that he was sentenced to death at the recommendation of an all-white Jury. Hall, 49, is Black, and the only one of the five people convicted for René's killing who was on death row. Chutkan also has concerns of the legality of the lethal injection drugs used.
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