MICHIGAN CITY -- The man who pleaded guilty to the 2001 rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl in downstate Spencer County is scheduled to be executed by the State of Indiana Friday before sunrise as a decades-long legal fight comes to an end.
Barring any highly unlikely last-minute legal intervention, Roy Lee Ward, 53, will be strapped to a chair early Friday morning and injected with the drug pentobarbital that will cause him to stop breathing and die.
A brutal murder, a small town, and a long legal battle
On July 11, 2001, Ward walked into the Dale, Indiana, home of 15-year-old Stacy Payne and raped her, beat her with a dumbbell and stabbed her with a knife, according to court documents from the case. She was flown to a hospital in Louisville, where she died five hours after Ward entered her house. Her autopsy revealed 18 blunt force injuries, plus a lacerated abdomen, lacerated back which severed her spine and lacerated trachea.
Ward was convicted by a jury in 2002 of rape, murder and criminal deviate conduct, and the judge imposed the recommended death sentence. Ward successfully appealed that conviction and was granted a new trial but pleaded guilty to the same charges and was sentenced again to death.
He has been on death row since 2007 and was initially scheduled to die on Dec. 11, 2012, before the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Indiana stayed Ward's execution date after he sought federal habeas relief, which the court ultimately denied.
In the days leading up to his new execution date, Ward reportedly withdrew the last two federal lawsuits that would have delayed his execution further, meaning that the only mechanisms still in play for staying the execution are a last-minute reprieve by the U.S. Supreme Court or a commutation by Gov. Mike Braun -- both of which are highly unlikely and have not come to fruition in recent Indiana executions.
Gov. Mike Braun last month declined to grant a stay of execution for Ward.
"After carefully reviewing the unanimous recommendation from the State Parole Board, I have decided to allow the execution of Roy Lee Ward to proceed as planned for Oct. 10," Braun said on Sept. 29.
Also in September, the Indiana Supreme Court unanimously rejected Ward's request to delay his execution, which he argued would give him more time to participate in a separate lawsuit against the state for refusing to share public records relating to its execution procedures.
Chief Justice Loretta Rush, writing on behalf of the state's high court, said Ward's pending motion to intervene in that case is an insufficient basis for postponing Ward's execution. In that ruling, the state's high court also rejected claims that the state's lethal injection process of the drug pentobarbital violates the constitution.
Ward is the third convicted murderer put to death by Indiana since December following a 15-year execution hiatus.
Gary diocese to organize vigil
As the hours tick toward the window where Ward will, in all likelihood, be put to death, members of the Diocese of Gary, including Bishop Robert McClory, and others from the public will gather in the parking lot outside the Michigan City state prison for a prayer vigil.
The diocese, in a news release, pointed out that the date Ward is scheduled to be lethally injected -- Oct. 10 -- is "World Day Against the Death Penalty."
The service is intended to be a peaceful gathering for reflection and prayer, not a rally, the diocese said.
McClory encouraged giving "public witness seeking an end to the death penalty in Indiana and worldwide." Doing so, he said, is a "witness to the value of all human life... to stand for the dignity of all human life, including those who have been victims of violence and for those themselves who await time on death row."
Richard Holy, director of pro-life activities for the Diocese of Gary and pastor of St. Edward in Lowell, said the death penalty does not serve justice.
"We sincerely mourn with all families who have had a loved one murdered," Holy said. "It is a heinous, horrible crime. We continue to be filled with revulsion and anger at the rape and murder of then-15-year-old Stacy Payne. We do not see justice served, however, in adding another human life to the death toll. The execution of Roy Ward will not bring Stacy back."
Third state execution this year
From December 2009 to December 2024, the State of Indiana did not execute anyone on death row -- the longest gap since the death penalty was reinstated in Indiana in 1981.
But on Dec. 18, Joseph Corcoran, 49, was put to death by lethal injection for the 1997 murders of his brother and three other men.
Hours before he died, Corcoran’s wife submitted a petition to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Amy Coney Barrett pleading to stay her husband’s execution, citing his untreated mental illness. The Supreme Court denied her petition and then-Gov. Eric Holcomb declined the last-ditch opportunity to commute Corcoran’s sentence to a lifetime prison term.
On May 20, the state executed Benjamin Ritchie by lethal injection for fatally shooting Beach Grove Police Officer William Toney.
Ritchie had spent more than 20 years on death row following his conviction. He was 20 years old when he and others stole a van in Beech Grove, near Indianapolis, in 2000. He then fired at Toney during a foot chase, killing him.
A controversial drug -- and a hefty price
The drug used by the State of Indiana to end the lives of convicted felons who have been sentenced to death is expensive and controversial.
Officials said the state will use pentobarbital, a type of nervous system depressant used to treat short-term insomnia or sedate patients prior to surgery, according to the National Institute of Health.
The drug differs from the three-drug cocktail which had been used in Indiana executions prior to Corcoran’s last December, one of which is generally in short supply, according to previous reporting from The Times. Another no longer will be sold or exported by its manufacturer if the drug is to be used for an execution.
In 2017, the Indiana General Assembly approved legislation that would guarantee confidentiality to any company that chooses to sell drugs to the state to be used for the execution.
For the last two executions and now for Ward’s on Friday, the state has chosen to restrict access to the proceedings, forbidding members of the media from attending the execution and restricting them to a "media area" outside the prison. Department of Correction officials have said previously media should not anticipate anyone coming out to speak to them or make a statement.
It has caused those opposed to execution as a form of punishment extra concern.
"This execution is taking place in total secrecy," David Frank, president of the Indiana Abolition Coalition, said ahead of Corcoran's December execution.
Gov. Mike Braun previously suggested due to the high cost of obtaining additional doses that he was inclined to wait for the Republican-controlled General Assembly to weigh in on the issue of capital punishment when it convenes in January 2026, including possible proposals to abolish the death penalty altogether or to change the method of execution to firing squad.
That's due, in part, to the drug's high cost.
Hoosier taxpayers spent $1.175 million to acquire four doses of the drug. Two were used while two others expired sitting on the shelf and were thrown away according to reporting by the Indiana Capital Chronicle.
The Republican chief executive explained that with a $300,000 price tag per lethal dose and just a 90-day shelf life it didn't make sense to acquire any additional supply when another Indiana execution -- at that time -- was not imminent.
But according to the Capital Chronicle's reporting presumably after Braun's comments the state purchased three sets of lethal injection drugs in recent months to be used by the Department of Correction. Officials have not disclosed price tags attached each dose.