The second execution of this year in Georgia has been scheduled for May. Georgia Attorney General Chris Carr announced today that Robert Earl Butts has been scheduled to be executed on Thursday, May 3rd.
Butts was convicted of shooting an off-duty correctional officer, Donovan Corey Parks, in the back of the head, after asking for a ride from the victim. Butts who was 18 at the time, was a noted member of the Folk gang when he committed the crime in Milledgeville in 1996.
The last inmate to be executed in Georgia was Carlton Gary, who was put to death by lethal injection in March. Gary was known as the stocking strangler, and was linked to seven murders in Columbus, Georgia.
According to the Marshall Project, out of the over 1,400 executions that have occurred nationwide since 1976, 71 have happened in Georgia.
Attorney General Carr said that Butts has used up all of his appeals and habeas corpus proceedings.