(The Center Square) – More than 40 years after Kingston Springs, Tenn., motel maid Catherine Jean Jenkins was stabbed to death, Anthony Darrell Hines was executed for her murder.
Jenkins’ son, Dennis Jenkins, graphically described how his mother died in a news conference held after Thursday’s execution, saying her only defense was a plastic spray bottle.
“And for those hot-shot attorneys out there that are trying to make a name for yourselves by defending these cold-blooded murderers, I don’t understand your mentality,” Dennis Jenkins said in the news conference broadcast on WSMV. “If it happened to one of your loved ones, whether you are just an outsider or an attorney, I just wonder how you would feel about that low-life animal that took that life.”
Jenkins’ daughter, Melissa, said the family’s focus is on honoring her mother’s memory.
“We will always mourn the wonderful person my mother was, even as we continue living our lives,” Melissa Jenkins said. “While today does not bring closure, nor does it bring my mother back, it does finally bring justice.”
Hines attorneys attempted to stop Thursday’s execution using a failed May execution of Tony Carruthers.
A primary IV line was already inserted into Carruthers, but medical personnel could not find a required second line for a backup, according to a statement from the Tennessee Department of Corrections.
Hines was paralyzed on one side from a stroke and had other health issues that could have made inserting an IV line a problem, his attorneys said in their appeals.
Gov. Bill Lee and the U.S. Supreme Court did not intervene in Hines’ execution.
Hines was pronounced dead by lethal injection at 10:43 a.m., said Tennessee Department of Correction Commissioner Frank Strada.
