A death row inmate just moments away from execution has had his life spared after a last-minute reprieve.
Tremane Wood, 46, was condemned to die for stabbing a man to death during a botched robbery on New Year’s Day 2002.
Wood, who has always denied the killing, was set to receive a lethal injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester at 10am local time on Thursday (4pm UK time).
But Oklahoma governor Kevin Stitt accepted the recommendation of the Pardon and Parole Board that he be spared, commuting his sentence to life in prison without parole.
The inmate admitted he took part in the robbery but has insisted it was his brother, Zjaiton Wood, who killed Ronnie Wipf, a 19-year-old migrant farmworker from Montana, at a north Oklahoma City hotel.
“I’m not a monster. I’m not a killer,” Tremane told the board via video link. “I never was, and I never have been.”
Tremane’s lawyer, Amanda Bass Castro Alves, said Zjaiton had admitted the killing to several people.
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Tremane’s legal team asked the US Supreme Court to stop the execution, but the court refused.
He told the parole board: “I regret my role in everything that happened that night.”
But prosecutors painted him as a dangerous criminal who has continued to commit crimes while incarcerated, including buying and selling drugs, using contraband mobile phones and ordering attacks on fellow inmates.
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“Even within the confines of maximum security prison, Tremane Wood has continued to manipulate, exploit and harm others,” said the state’s attorney general Gentner Drummond.
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Before making his decision, a spokesperson for the governor said he would meet prosecutors, defence attorneys and members of the victim’s family.
He has granted clemency just once before during his nearly seven years in office.
The Republican governor has served two terms and cannot run for re-election in 2026.
Zjaiton Wood was serving a life sentence without parole when he died behind bars in 2019.
His brother’s execution was one of three scheduled this week in the US.
