Dallas-area officer's killer put to death

HUNTSVILLE — A man convicted of gunning down a Dallas-area police officer during an attempted bank robbery was put to death Thursday evening in the first execution of the year in the nation's busiest death penalty state.

Kenneth Mosley, 51, was condemned for the February 1997 slaying of David Moore, an officer in the Dallas suburb of Garland. His lethal injection was carried out after his legal appeals became exhausted.

The punishment had been stalled twice last year by technical issues and court appeals.

Mosley shook his head once when asked by a warden if he had any final statement. As the lethal drugs began taking effect, he snored a few times, then gasped slightly. Nine minutes later, at 6:16 p.m. CST, he was pronounced dead.

Moore's widow was among the people in the chamber to watch Mosley die. He did not acknowledge her presence.

Earlier this week, the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles denied his request for clemency.

Texas put 24 convicted killers to death last year, accounting for nearly half of the 52 executions carried out in the U.S. Another convicted killer was scheduled to be executed in Texas next week.

Moore, 32, was killed while responding to a 911 call about a bank robbery. The 10-year police veteran and father of three was shot four times after he approached Mosley, who was standing in line to get to a teller. A bank employee had called 911 after recognizing Mosley as the man who robbed it more than month earlier.

Mosley resisted Moore's request to speak with him and opened fire with a 9 mm pistol. One of four bullets to hit the officer struck over the top edge of his protective vest, killing him. Mosley was shot in the wrist by an officer outside and was arrested in the parking lot. Authorities found he was carrying a holdup note.

His lawyers argued at his capital murder trial that the shooting was accidental, saying the weapon went off five times as he was trying to surrender. Prosecutors had witnesses from inside the bank and a videotape of the attack to show to jurors.

Mosley declined to speak with reporters as his execution neared.

The Flint, Mich., native who grew up in rural Arkansas had an extensive criminal record he blamed on drug addiction. Evidence showed he had a record for sexually assaulting a woman and arrests for possession of marijuana, illegal knives and for stealing items from a Home Depot and then returning them for cash refunds.

At the time of the shooting, he was wanted for robbery at a fast-food restaurant five days earlier in nearby Mesquite. He had been fired from his last known job at a Coca-Cola bottler for testing positive for cocaine.

Garland Police Chief Mitch Bates, a lieutenant in 1997 who was the patrol supervisor and the officer who took Mosley into custody at the scene, said he had “no doubt that Mosley would have seriously injured or killed some other citizens and or police officers during his continued life of violent crime.”

About two dozen officers from the Garland police force stood outside the Huntsville prison where the execution took place.

Next week, the state is set to execute Gary Johnson, 59, for the shooting deaths of two men, Peter Sparagana, 23, and James Hazelton, 28, who interrupted his burglary of a ranch near Huntsville in 1986.

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