Death Row Inmate Screams in Agony During Execution as Heart Device Was Left On

A 69-year-old Tennessee death row inmate was executed Tuesday morning despite urgent warnings from doctors and advocates that his heart device could deliver repeated, agonizing shocks during the process.

Byron Black, convicted of the 1988 murders of his girlfriend Angela Clay and her two young daughters, was put to death by lethal injection at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville. He was pronounced dead at 10:43 a.m. local time, according to the Associated Press. Black, who had been on death row for more than 30 years, offered no final words.

Witnesses described a disturbing scene. Black reportedly groaned, gasped, and cried out, “It’s hurting so bad,” during the execution — sparking fresh outrage over Tennessee’s handling of death penalty procedures.

At the center of the controversy: Black’s implantable cardioverter defibrillator — a medical device designed to shock the heart when it detects irregular rhythms. For weeks, Black’s legal team had warned that leaving the device active could result in the device fighting against the execution drugs, potentially shocking him multiple times as he died.

Black’s attorney, Kelley Henry, didn’t mince words. “I interpret that my client was tortured today,” she told NBC News.

A lower court initially agreed and ordered the defibrillator deactivated. But Tennessee’s Supreme Court reversed the decision, arguing the lower court lacked the authority to make that call. Meanwhile, Nashville General Hospital, where the device had been implanted, refused to shut it off, citing ethical concerns.

Black’s legal team had also pushed for clemency, pointing to his long list of health issues, including intellectual disability, heart and kidney failure, and dementia. At the time of his death, Black was in a wheelchair and considered medically frail. None of those factors spared him. His final appeals were denied by both the U.S. Supreme Court and Tennessee Governor Bill Lee.

After the execution, Black’s attorneys announced plans to request a full autopsy and access to the device’s internal data to determine whether it delivered shocks during the procedure.

Black is the second person executed in Tennessee this year, following the state’s resumption of lethal injections after a pause caused by earlier botched protocols. Legal experts told The Washington Post that this may be the first recorded execution in the U.S. where an inmate died with an active defibrillator still implanted — a move some are calling unprecedented and medically reckless.