Perry: No pause in executions in Texas

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) on Sunday blamed the state of Oklahoma for a “botched” execution of a death row inmate last week, but said his state will proceed with the death penalty without pause.

“In Texas, our citizens have decided if you kill our children, if you kill our police officers, for those very heinous crimes, that the appropriate punishment is the death penalty,” Perry said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”

Commenting on the failed execution of Clayton Lockett, who died from a heart attack after a lethal injection filed to kill him, Perry said something went “terribly wrong.”

“I don’t know whether it was inhumane or not, but it was botched,” he said.

Texas currently has 273 people on death row. The Lone Star State has executed more than 500 people – the most of any state – since the Supreme Court reaffirmed the death penalty in 1976.

In the wake Oklahoma’s botched execution on Thursday, many critics have called for halt to the death penalty, arguing that it is inhumane.

President Obama and others have spoken out against the botched execution.

But on Sunday, Perry said his state has a more humane way of killing death row inmates.

“The process of the actual execution, I would suggest to you, is very different from Oklahoma,” Perry said. “We only use one drug. But I’m confident that the way the executions are taken care of in the state of Texas are appropriate and humane.”