Arizona Supreme Court grants request to carry out state’s 1st execution since 2022

PHOENIX —The Arizona Supreme Court granted a request to carry out the state’s first execution since 2022, authorities announced on Tuesday.

Convicted killer Aaron Gunches will receive a lethal injection on March 19. 

Gunches was convicted in 2007 for the 2002 kidnapping and murder of Ted Price. Gunches originally pleaded guilty in 2004 to murdering Price, his girlfriend’s ex-husband. He was sentenced to death in 2008 and again in 2013 after the Arizona Supreme Court found an error in the first sentencing proceeding.

Under state law, executions must be carried out 35 days after a warrant is issued.

Arizona hasn’t carried out a death sentence since executing three death row inmates in 2022. Those executions ended a nearly eight-year hiatus following a 2014 execution. The state later had difficulties obtaining lethal injection drugs.

On Dec. 6, Attorney General Kris Mayes filed a motion to establish a briefing schedule in the long-running death penalty case.

An earlier execution warrant for Gunches was issued in March 2023, but Gov. Katie Hobbs refused to carry it out and won a legal battle to put it on hold.

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