“I was a very confused kid. I had some issues going on in my head that I didn’t know how to fix, and the only way I knew to feel acceptance was doing some of the stupid stuff I was doing with the people I was doing it with. I felt like they were family at that point,” McWhorter said of his mental state at the time of the crime.
McWhorter acknowledged that he participated in the crime, and that he fired first. Although, he maintained he did not fire the final shots. Lawyers for Miner in a 2016 appeal maintained that McWhorter did the shooting.
Efforts to reach the victim’s family through the attorney general’s office and a victims’ advocacy group were unsuccessful.
In his final appeals before the US Supreme Court, McWhorter’s attorneys raised his age at the time of the crime and also argued that the state did not give him the required 30 days notice of an execution date.
The US Supreme Court in 2005 ruled that people cannot be executed for crimes committed under the age of 18. McWhorter’s attorneys argued that Alabama law, however, does not consider a teen to be a full adult until they reach 19 and does not allow 18-year-olds to serve on juries. His lawyers argued it would be unconstitutional to execute someone under the legal age of adulthood in their state.
“There is emerging research showing that there is nothing magic about turning 18 when it comes to brain science – 18-year-olds continue to develop and mature,” attorneys for McWhorter wrote.
Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall’s office urged the high court to let the execution proceed. The state argued in a court filing that the law is clear that a state may “impose capital punishment on 18-year-old offenders.”
The attorney general’s office said the crime was premeditated, and that after the slaying “McWhorter methodically gathered items from the home, including retrieving Williams’s wallet from his dead body, before driving away in Williams’ pick-up truck.”
McWhorter told The Associated Press ahead of the execution that he is “concerned about family and friends and loved ones, how they’re dealing with things.”
He said he would encourage young people going through difficult times to take a moment before making a life-altering mistake like he did.
“Anything that comes across them that just doesn’t sit well at first, take a few seconds to think that through,” he said. “Because one bad choice, one stupid mistake, one dumb decision can alter your life — and those that you care about — forever.”
The state of Texas is also scheduled to carry out an execution on Thursday evening (local time). David Renteria, 53, is scheduled to be put to death after being convicted of strangling a 5-year-old girl taken from an El Paso store in 2001.
