New execution date set for Tennessee death row inmate

NASHVILLE – The Tennessee Supreme Court has set a new execution date of Nov. 1 for a death row inmate who has asked for the electric chair rather than lethal injection.

The state’s highest court announced the date in a written notice Monday.

Edmund Zagorski was set to die on Oct. 11 but won a late reprieve from Gov. Bill Haslam amid a flurry of legal manoeuvrs. Among the issues was his request to die in the electric chair as a quicker and less painful execution method than lethal injection.

Tennessee is one of nine states that allow electrocutions, but none have been carried out that way since a 2013 execution in Virginia.

The 63-year-old Zagorski was sentenced to death in 1984 for killing two men he robbed during a drug deal.