Utah man who killed woman put to death by lethal injection in state’s first execution since 2010
SALT LAKE CITY — A Utah man who murdered his girlfriend’s mother by slitting her throat was put to death by lethal injection Thursday morning, the first execution in the state since 2010.
Taberon Dave Honie, 48, was convicted of aggravated murder in connection with the death of Claudia Benn in July 1998.
Honie was 22 when he broke into Benn’s Cedar City home after a day of heavy drinking and drug use and repeatedly slit her throat and stabbed her in other parts of her body. Benn’s grandchildren, including Honie’s then 2-year-old daughter, were in the house at the time.
The judge who sentenced him to death found that Honie had sexually abused one of the children, one of the aggravating factors in that decision.
Honie’s last meal before his execution was a cheeseburger, fries and a milkshake, according to the Utah Department of Corrections. Honie spent the evening with his family before the execution.
After decades of failed appeals, Honie’s execution warrant was signed in June, despite defense objections to the planned lethal drug combination. In July, the state has amended its implementation protocol to use only a high dose of pentobarbital, the nervous system depressant used to euthanize pets.
The Utah Board of Pardons and Parole Honie’s request for reduced sentence denied to life in prison after a two-day hearing in July. Honie’s lawyers said he grew up on the Hopi Indian reservation in Arizona, with parents who drank too much and neglected him.
Utah Governor Spencer Cox, a Republican, also rejected a final request from Honie to stay the execution.
Honie told the parole board that he would not have killed Benn if he had been in his ‘sane’ state of mind. He asked the board to allow him to “exist” so that he could support his daughter.
Tressa Honie told the council that she has a complicated relationship with her mother and that she would lose the parent who most supports her if her father were executed.
However, other family members felt that Taberon Honie did not deserve mercy.
They described Benn as a pillar of support to their family and the southwestern Utah community: a member of the Paiute Tribe, a substance abuse counselor and a caregiver to her children and grandchildren.
Sarah China Azule, Benn’s cousin, said she was pleased with the board’s decision to proceed with Honie’s execution.
“He earns an eye for an eye,” she said.
Honie was one of six people threatened with execution in Utah.
A seventh man, Douglas Lovell, who murdered a woman to prevent her from testifying against him in a rape case, recently had his death sentence overturned by the Utah Supreme Court. He will be resentenced.
A man described by his lawyers as mentally disabled was executed in Texas hours earlier for strangling and attempting to rape a woman who went jogging near her Houston home more than 27 years ago. Arthur Lee Burton was sentenced to death for the July 1997 murder of Nancy Adleman, a 48-year-old mother of three. Police found her beaten and strangled with her own shoelace in a wooded area off a jogging path near a swamp.