Tony Von Carruthers was scheduled to die by lethal injection on May 21.
Executioners spent more than an hour trying to place an IV line into his body before the execution was canceled. Soon after, Gov. Bill Lee issued a reprieve and called off the execution until May 2027. Carruthers’ attorneys plan to continue pushing the state to test DNA and fingerprint evidence in a three-decade-old crime.
Meanwhile, in the days since the “botched” execution at the Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, Carruthers’ family, some lawmakers and advocates against the death penalty are calling for more truth and transparency in the state’s execution protocol, about what happened in the chamber and in the case against Carruthers.
“Our brother was falsely accused, wrongly convicted, incarcerated for 32 years, and then tortured by Dr. Mark Fowler and the state of Tennessee,” said Tonya Carruthers Hervey, 59. “He believed in the justice system, but it did not work for him.”
The yearlong pause in Carruthers’ execution feels like a blessing and an opportunity to set the record straight, Hervey said. “I’ve been doing holy dances all around my house,” she said. “We wholeheartedly 100% believe in our brother’s innocence.”
What happened inside the execution chamber?
In Tennessee, when executions are scheduled, the lethal injection process starts at 10 a.m. Within five minutes, the person strapped to the gurney is pronounced dead, according to state protocol.
That did not happen to Carruthers.
Around 10 a.m., six media witnesses, including one reporter from MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, were seated and waiting in the parole board hearing room at the prison. Around 10:30, the reporters were escorted to the media witness room. It was a small, dark area with cinderblock walls. A dark gray curtain covered the windows between the execution chamber and the witness room.
Back in East Memphis, Hervey, her two brothers and other members of their family were gathered in the living room — waiting to hear the news of Carruthers’ death.
“We wanted to be there for each other because my brother said he did not want any of us to be in the room watching him get executed,” Hervey said. She said it’s felt like she’s been slowly walking to her brother’s funeral for the last 32 years. She faithfully speaks with and visits him, despite the three hours of highway between them.
On May 13, Hervey visited her younger brother. She thought it was the last time she’d see him alive.
“It was a good visit. I could tell he was just hanging on,” Hervey said. “He said, ‘I love y’all, and just know that God is with me.’”
On the day of the execution, several minutes passed after the scheduled time. Hervey had not yet heard from Carruthers’ attorneys. “We knew something wasn’t right,” she said.
Reporters waited for more than an hour in the dark media witness room for the curtains to be lifted and for the execution to begin. There were sounds coming from the execution chamber: doors opening and closing, velcro straps being ripped apart, men and women speaking and the sound of someone groaning in pain. The waiting continued.
At 11:46 a.m., media witnesses learned Carruthers was being taken back to his cell. The reporters were escorted back to the parole board hearing room. A Tennessee Department of Corrections spokesperson said they had paused the lethal injection process because executioners could not find a vein.
“That means he’s dehydrated,” a TDOC officer said.
Around 12:30 p.m., media witnesses were escorted out of the prison, and TDOC released a statement: “Medical personnel quickly established a primary IV line; however, the team was unable to immediately establish a backup line … The team attempted to insert a central line pursuant to the protocol, but the procedure was unsuccessful.”
Maria DeLiberato, Carruthers’ lawyer, was in the room with him as executioners tried to start the process.
Carruthers was strapped to a gurney as executioners inserted the first IV line into his [left] arm, DeLiberato said. Then, they tried inserting a second IV line into his [right] arm. When it didn’t work, they tried to find a vein in Carruthers’ feet. Then, executioners aimed for the jugular vein in his neck.
Next, executioners gave Carruthers a dose of lidocaine to numb the pain and tried to establish a central line in his chest. At this point, Carruthers told executioners he was in pain, DeLiberato said. Finally, they tried to insert an IV line into his shoulder, but Carruthers’ blood began backing up into the line, DeLiberato said.
At this point, the lethal injection was called off, but executioners had spent more than an hour trying to find a suitable vein in Carruthers’ body.
“This was a tortured, botched execution. There’s no question about it,” said DeLiberato. She is an attorney with the ACLU’s Capital Punishment Project, which works to end the death penalty in the United States. “The fact that (Carruthers) said ‘I can feel that and it hurts’ and they stuck him anyway, that is a violation of the Eighth Amendment.”
When the governor issued the reprieve, DeLiberato was moved to tears. “I cannot wait to tell his family,” she said.
Pushing for truth and transparency
DeLiberato requested that Carruthers be taken to the prison’s medical unit for examination after the execution attempt. He remains on death row at Riverbend, and his attorneys will continue pushing the state to test DNA evidence in his case.
“Tony has a deep faith in God, and I know that he believed that this botched attempt to take his life happened for a reason,” DeLiberato said. “It will strengthen his resolve to fight even more.”
While questions arise about the qualifications of the medical doctor who tried to insert the central line into Carruthers’ chest, researchers have long expressed concern about how prisons try to “medicalize executions” with the use of drugs.
“You’ve got a gurney. You’ve got IV lines,” said Frank Romanelli, a pharmacy professor at the University of Kentucky. He’s been researching the use of lethal injections in executions since 2008. “You’ve made it look like a clinical situation when it’s not a clinical situation.”
For years, drug manufacturers have fought against the use of their medicines in lethal injections. Romanelli said the drugs “were never intended to be used for” and “have not been studied for lethal injection.” He also questioned the qualifications and training of the executioners since professional medical associations have stated “pharmacists, nurses and physicians should not be actively participating in any of these procedures,” Romanelli said.
“A lot of those different lines, like a jugular line and a central line, require a greater level of expertise to conduct and different equipment,” he said.
In Tennessee, executioners use pentobarbital in lethal injections. In a medical setting, the drug is used as a sedative to treat anxiety, seizures and insomnia and to induce comas. Much of the state’s lethal injection protocol — including involved medical personnel and how the drugs are obtained and stored — is kept a secret.
Tennessee State Rep. Gabby Salinas is hoping to change this. During the most recent legislative session, Salinas co-sponsored House Bill 2168, which would publicize the drug suppliers, their qualifications and how much they are paid. As of March, the bill remained in committee, and the legislative session ended in April.
Increasing transparency about how the state conducts lethal injections seems to be a bipartisan issue. Republicans in the House and Senate sponsored HB 2168. Democrats in both chambers co-sponsored the bill: Salinas and Sen. Raumesh Akbari, both Democrats who represent Memphis. Salinas is hopeful the bill will be picked up again in the next legislative session, which begins in January.
“I think there’s interest for transparency on both sides of the aisle, whether you are for capital punishment or against capital punishment,” Salinas told MLK50 in an interview. Because of her faith as a Catholic and her training as a pharmacist, Salinas opposes the death penalty, she said.
As a cancer survivor, she “is probably one of the very few representatives that has actually had a central line,” Salinas said. She described it as an “invasive procedure” where medical professionals are “going after bigger veins.” She expressed concern that executioners did not use enough sedation when trying to place a central line in Carruthers’ body, but because of the state’s policies, much of what happens inside Tennessee’s execution chamber will remain unknown to the public unless state laws are changed.
“This is happening in our name at the hands of the state, and I think any state that carries out killing of its own people should not shy away from answering questions and doing it in a transparent manner,” Salinas said.
According to TDOC data, more than half of the 42 people on death row in Tennessee were convicted in Shelby County, including Carruthers. In 2020, during the pandemic, the state paused executions. In 2024, the state’s lethal injection protocol was revised, and in 2025, the state resumed executions. Last year, Tennessee used lethal injections to execute Oscar Franklin Smith, Byron Lewis Black and Harold Wayne Nichols. During Black’s execution, he complained of pain, and an autopsy report showed signs of pulmonary edema, or the buildup of fluid in the lungs.
There are three more executions scheduled this year: Darrell Hines in August, Christa Pike in September and Gary Sutton in December. However, Carruthers’ attorneys are calling on the state to pause all executions.
“The death penalty should not be allowed in what is supposed to be a civilized country,” said Hervey. “Let’s pray that in the next 12 months his attorneys can really help him to prove his innocence because he was not given the opportunity to be proven guilty. He was proven guilty in the media before the case even went to trial.”
Brittany Brown is the public safety reporter for MLK50: Justice Through Journalism. Email her at brittany.brown@mlk50.com
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