{"id":210722,"date":"2026-05-15T04:50:46","date_gmt":"2026-05-15T04:50:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/oklahoma-executes-a-man-convicted-of-killing-his-ex-girlfriend-and-her-7-month-old-daughter-nbc-news\/"},"modified":"2026-05-15T04:50:46","modified_gmt":"2026-05-15T04:50:46","slug":"oklahoma-executes-a-man-convicted-of-killing-his-ex-girlfriend-and-her-7-month-old-daughter-nbc-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/oklahoma-executes-a-man-convicted-of-killing-his-ex-girlfriend-and-her-7-month-old-daughter-nbc-news\/","title":{"rendered":"Oklahoma executes a man convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend and her 7-month-old daughter – NBC News"},"content":{"rendered":"

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McALESTER, Okla. \u2014 Oklahoma has executed<\/a> a man who was convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend and her 7-month-old daughter nearly 20 years ago.
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Raymond Johnson, 52, was pronounced dead at 10:12 a.m. Thursday following a three-drug injection at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester, prison officials said.
He was sentenced to death for killing 24-year-old Brooke Whitaker and her 7-month-old daughter, Kya, in June 2007.
\u201cTo Brooke and Kya and your family, I want to apologize for my actions and the pain I caused you,\u201d Johnson said while strapped to a gurney inside the death chamber. \u201cI hope people can speak your names without my name attached to it. I hurt you. One day, I hope you can forgive me.\u201d
Johnson\u2019s spiritual advisor, Kurt Borgmann, read Scripture in the chamber during the execution, which lasted about 11 minutes. A tear rolled out of Johnson\u2019s left eye as Borgmann began to speak. A doctor entered the room and declared Johnson unconscious about six minutes after the first drugs began to flow.
Oklahoma uses the sedative midazolam, followed by vecuronium bromide to halt breathing and potassium chloride to stop the heart.
Angie Short, one of Whitaker\u2019s aunt, criticized the delays in an execution originally scheduled for May 2024, saying Whitaker\u2019s mom died about five months after that.
\u201cBecause of the delays, my sister didn\u2019t get to witness justice,\u201d Short said. \u201cThis couldn\u2019t bring them back. But we\u2019ll no longer have to see his face on TV. He\u2019s no longer associated with Brooke and Kya. Now I think we can finally begin to heal after 20 years.\u201d
Prosecutors said Johnson and Whitaker had been arguing at her home in Tulsa before he repeatedly hit her over the head with a metal claw hammer. Whitaker\u2019s skull was fractured and she had more than 20 lacerations on her face and scalp. But she was still conscious and begged Johnson to spare her and Kya, who was sleeping in a bedroom, prosecutors said in documents prepared for Johnson\u2019s clemency hearing in April.
\u201cShe begged him to call 911. She begged him to let her mom come get baby Kya. She begged him to think of her children,\u201d the Oklahoma Attorney General\u2019s Office said. Whitaker had three other children.
Johnson retrieved a gas can from a tool shed in the backyard, doused Whitaker and the house with gasoline, lit a dish towel on fire, threw it at Whitaker and left, the attorney general\u2019s office said. Whitaker died from head injuries and smoke inhalation while her daughter died from severe burns.
\u201cI pray that Brooke\u2019s and Kya\u2019s family find some measure of peace today after enduring unimaginable pain and grief for nearly two decades,\u201d Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond said in a statement.
Johnson\u2019s attorneys did not file a last-minute appeal with the U.S. Supreme Court to stop his execution. His attorneys unsuccessfully argued in earlier appeals that Johnson\u2019s arrest was illegal, police coerced his confession from him and that his trial lawyer conceded his guilt in Whitaker\u2019s death without his permission.
In April, Oklahoma\u2019s five-member Pardon and Parole Board voted unanimously to deny Johnson clemency. During that clemency hearing, Johnson apologized to the victims\u2019 family and asked for forgiveness, saying he was a changed person.
\u201cI apologize. No excuses, no justifications, a sincere apology. And to know that it\u2019s sincere, look at my actions. Look at my life. Look how I\u2019ve changed. I\u2019m living a remorseful life. I\u2019m living it,\u201d Johnson said in an interview with Death Penalty Action, a national anti-death penalty group.
Whitaker\u2019s family members asked for the lethal injection to proceed.
\u201cExecuting him will not give me my mom or sister back, it will not take away almost 20 years of pain. What it will do is finally stop him from continuing to hurt us,\u201d Logan Kleck, Whitaker\u2019s oldest daughter, said in a letter to the board. Kleck did not witness the execution.
In addition to his first-degree murder conviction, Johnson also served nine years of a 20-year sentence after being convicted of manslaughter in 1996.
Johnson was the second person put to death this year in Oklahoma<\/a> and the 11th in the country.
© 2026 NBCUniversal Media, LLC<\/p>\n

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news AlertsThere are no new alerts at this timeMcALESTER, Okla. \u2014 Oklahoma has executed a man who was convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend and her 7-month-old daughter nearly 20 years ago.Subscribe to read this story ad-free Get unlimited access to ad-free articles and exclusive content.Raymond Johnson, 52, was pronounced dead at 10:12 a.m. Thursday following […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":210723,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-210722","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-us","8":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210722","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=210722"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/210722\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/210723"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=210722"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=210722"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=210722"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}