In Utah’s first execution since 2010, Taberon Dave Honie, 48, was put to death by lethal injection early Thursday. He was convicted of the aggravated murder of Claudia Benn in July 1998.
Honie, then 22, broke into Benn’s Cedar City home after a day of heavy drinking and drug use. He repeatedly slashed her throat and stabbed her in other parts of her body. At the time, Benn’s grandchildren, including Honie’s then 2-year-old daughter, were in the house.
The judge who sentenced Honie to death cited his sexual abuse of one of the children as an aggravating factor in the decision.
Before his execution, Honie had a final meal consisting of a cheeseburger, french fries, and a milkshake, according to the Utah Department of Corrections. He spent the evening with his family.
Outside the prison, anti-death penalty protesters held signs reading “All life is precious” and sang “Amazing Grace.”
After decades of failed appeals, Honie’s execution warrant was signed in June despite defense objections to the planned lethal drug. In July, the state changed its execution protocol to use a high dose of pentobarbital, a nervous system suppressant used for euthanizing pets.
The Utah Board of Pardons and Parole denied Honie’s petition to commute his sentence to life in prison after a two-day hearing in July. Honie’s attorneys argued he grew up on the Hopi Indian Reservation in Arizona with parents who abused alcohol and neglected him. Utah Gov. Spencer Cox also denied Honie’s final request to delay the execution.
Honie told the parole board he wouldn’t have killed Benn if he had been in his “right mind” and asked to be allowed to live so he could support his daughter. Tressa Honie, his daughter, said she had a complicated relationship with her mother and would lose her most supportive parental figure if her father were executed. However, other family members insisted that Honie deserved no mercy.
Benn was described as a pillar of her family and community, a Paiute tribal member, a substance abuse counselor, and caregiver. Sarah China Azule, Benn’s niece, expressed satisfaction with the board’s decision to proceed with the execution, stating, “He deserves an eye for an eye.”
Honie was one of six people facing execution in Utah. The death sentence for a seventh person, Douglas Lovell, was recently overturned by the Utah Supreme Court, and he will be resentenced.
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On the same day, a man described by his lawyers as intellectually disabled was executed in Texas for a crime committed over 27 years ago. Arthur Lee Burton was put to death for the July 1997 murder of Nancy Adleman, who was found beaten and strangled with her own shoelace near a jogging trail in Houston.
