McVeigh put to death

TERRE HAUTE -- At about 7:20 a.m. today, Timothy McVeigh will taste rubber. His body will tingle with a cool sensation.\nThen he'll sputter and draw his last gasp of air.\nMcVeigh, convicted of bombing the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City in a 1995 blast that killed 168 people and injured hundreds more, will be the first person executed by the federal government in 38 years.\nMcVeigh spent Sunday in an isolated 9-by-14 foot cell, just a short walk from the execution chamber. His attorney, Nathan Chambers, described him as being in "good spirits" after a Saturday meeting.\n"He's upbeat," Chambers said. "He's very at peace with the decision he made."\nIn December, McVeigh called off all appeals, asking to be put to death as early as possible. But his execution was postponed three weeks after the FBI made an eleventh-hour confession to withholding more than 4,000 documents from McVeigh's defense team.\nThe 33-year-old Gulf War veteran appealed to allow his attorneys more time to review the evidence, but a federal judge in Denver denied any further delay. Again, McVeigh asked to die.\nAnd by all accounts, he's resigned himself to it.\nDavid Paul Hammer, a fellow federal death row inmate, described McVeigh as "a soldier in lock-'n-load mode" in his online journal. By Hammer's account, McVeigh is angling for martyrdom.\n"His face is pulled tight and his body is slim to the point of resembling a starved person," he wrote. "At 6'2 he weighs only 157 pounds. All of this is by design, planned to the most minute detail.\n"All for impression and purpose." \nMcVeigh has willed all of his possessions to his fellow inmates. He gave Hammer a picture of himself with the inscription: "My head is bloodied, but it remains unbowed."\nAt 4:10 a.m. Sunday, prison guards whisked McVeigh into his holding cell. He lived out the last hours of his life in a small room with a sink, a metal toilet and a bed mounted to the wall.\nA long interior window opened to an adjoining room. As a precaution, guards kept an eye on the unremorseful killer around the clock to ensure that he didn't attempt to commit suicide.\nAt about 5 a.m. today, Vigo County Deputy Coroner Kevin Mayes will examine McVeigh's body through the glass partition. McVeigh will then sign a statement saying he hasn't been abused, a legal formality intended to shield prison officials from potential lawsuits.\nAccording to Bureau of Prisons protocol, McVeigh will then be required to put on khaki pants, a white T-shirt and slip-on tennis shoes. After a strip search, guards will lead McVeigh down to the execution chamber, a room with green tiles and drapes covering the four witness rooms.\nHe'll be strapped down in the gurney, with restraints binding his chest, waist, arms and legs.\nTechnicians will insert the IVs that will send a lethal chemical cocktail -- worth $86 -- coursing through his veins. Prison spokesman James Cross said a sheet will be draped over his body to keep the needles from view.\nPromptly at 7 a.m., the drapes will open. An undisclosed number of government officials will view the execution, along with victims, media representatives and those invited by McVeigh.\nWarden Harley Lappin and U.S. Marshall Frank Anderson will remain in the chamber with McVeigh. Lappin will ask McVeigh if he would like to make a final statement.\nMcVeigh told the authors of "American Terrorist: Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City Bombing" that he plans to quote William Ernest Henley's 19th-century poem "Invictus."\nLatin for "unconquered," "Invictus" closes with the lines: "I am the master of my fate; I am the captain of my soul."\nOf course, McVeigh might have changed his mind since conducting 75 hours of interviews with Dan Herbeck and Lou Michel, reporters for the Buffalo News, McVeigh's hometown paper. But an apology won't be forthcoming.\n"He's sorry that 168 people died," Chambers said after his Saturday meeting. "He takes no joy in that. But in his view, in his opinion, in pursuing his goal, it was necessary."\nLappin will read the judgment, and Anderson will then check with the Justice Department to make sure no last-minute stay has been granted. McVeigh waived his appeal, so the execution will go ahead.\nUpon Lappin's signal, sodium pentothal will be pumped into his veins. An anesthetic, it will put him to sleep by preventing his brain cells from reacting to nerve impulses. Technicians will then administer a dose of pancuronium, which will relax his lungs.\nThe last drug, potassium chloride, will block the electrical signals inside his heart, resulting in irreversible brain damage. Within five minutes, McVeigh will take his last breath.\nMayes will then enter, check McVeigh's vital signs and pronounce him dead. Vigo County Coroner Susan Amos will sign the death certificate, which will list "lethal injection" as the cause of death and "homicide" as the manner.