Arizona inmate executed, state’s second in 8 days

Arizona inmate executed, state’s second in 8 days

FLORENCE, Ariz. (AP) — Arizona has executed an inmate for killing a Scottsdale man while robbing his home in 1991 — the second death sentence carried out in the state in eight days.

Forty-seven-year-old Robert Charles Towery was given a lethal injection today at the state prison in Florence.

He was executed despite last-minute arguments from his attorneys that he had an extremely difficult childhood, ineffective attorneys and that his accomplice spent less than a decade in prison.

Towery had been on death row for nearly 20 years for killing Mark Jones.

Randy Allen Barker, the other man convicted in the killing, was given a plea deal for testifying against Towery and served just under 10 years in prison on a second-degree murder conviction. Barker was released in 2001.