Texas puts man to death in first 2017 execution

The state of Texas put a man to death by lethal injection on Wednesday in the United States’s first execution of 2017, according to USA Today.

Christopher Wilkins, who was convicted in 2008 of murdering two men during a drug deal, reportedly muttered “I’m sorry” as relatives of one of the victims watched the execution.

He was pronounced dead at 6:29 p.m.

{mosads}According to a 2008 report in The Houston Chronicle, Wilkins told the jury that “it is no big deal” whether or not they chose to give him the death penalty.

“I guess, subconsciously, I’ve been trying to get myself killed since I was 12 or 13 years old. I don’t have nothing to live for. I haven’t been any good to anybody for the last 20 years and I won’t be for the next 20 or the 20 after that,” the man told an attorney, according to the newspaper.

Texas has eight additional inmates slated for execution in early 2017, according to USA Today.

Twenty-nine people were put to death in the U.S. in 2016.