A Utah man who murdered his girlfriend’s mother by slashing her neck was executed by lethal injection early Thursday, the state’s first since 2010.
Taberon Dave Honie, 48, was found guilty of aggravated murder in the July 1998 killing of Claudia Benn.
Honie was 22 years old when he stormed into Benn’s residence in Cedar City after a day of heavy drinking and drug usage, slit her neck many times, and stabbed her in other places. Benn’s grandkids, including Honie’s two-year-old daughter, were there at the moment.
The court who condemned him to death discovered that Honie had sexually molested one of the children, which was one of the aggravating circumstances in the ruling.
According to the Utah Department of Corrections, Honie’s final meal before his execution consisted of a cheeseburger, french fries, and milkshake. Honie spent the evening with his family before being executed.
After decades of unsuccessful appeals, Honie’s execution warrant was issued in June, despite defense objections to the intended fatal medication combination. In July, the state altered its execution process to solely employ a high dosage of pentobarbital, a nervous system suppressor used to euthanize dogs.
Following a two-day hearing in July, the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole refused Honie’s plea to reduce his sentence to life in prison. Honie’s counsel said that he grew up on the Hopi Indian Reservation in Arizona with parents who drank alcohol and mistreated him.
Utah Gov. Spencer Cox, a Republican, also dismissed Honie’s last appeal to postpone the execution.
Honie told the parole board that he would not have murdered Benn if he had been in his “right mind.” He requested that the board allow him “to exist” so that he could support his daughter.
Tressa Honie told the board that she and her mother have a troubled relationship and that if her father is killed, she would lose her most supportive parental figure.
However, some family members contended that Taberon Honie deserved no leniency.
They praised Benn as a foundation of their family and the southwestern Utah community, as a Paiute tribe member, drug misuse counselor, and caretaker for her children and grandkids.
Sarah China Azule, Benn’s niece, said she was pleased with the board’s decision to proceed with Honie’s execution.
“He deserves an eye for an eye,” she said.
Honie was one of six persons scheduled for death in Utah.
The Utah Supreme Court recently reversed Douglas Lovell’s death sentence for murdering a woman in order to prevent her from testifying against him in a rape case. He’ll be resentenced.
A man, described by his defenders as mentally challenged, was killed a few hours earlier in Texas for strangling and attempting to rape a lady who was jogging near her Houston home more than 27 years ago.
Arthur Lee Burton had been sentenced to death for the July 1997 murder of Nancy Adleman, a 48-year-old mother of three who authorities discovered battered and strangled with her own shoelace in a secluded location along a jogging track along a swamp.