Peninsula Daily News and The Associated Press
OLYMPIA — The head doctor of the Washington Department of Corrections has resigned to avoid an ethical conflict over the pending execution of a Sequim double-murderer.
Dr. Marc Stern told The Olympian newspaper that using doctors to prepare for an execution is unethical. He says the American Medical Association and the Society of Correctional Physicians back him up. They both oppose doctor involvement in executions.
Stern says the only way he could find to take himself out of the execution plan for convicted murderer Darold Ray Stenson was to resign.
Stenson, 55, was convicted on two counts of first degree aggravated murder in 1994 in the shooting deaths of his 28-year-old wife, Denise, and business partner Frank Hoerner, 33, at his bird farm southwest of Sequim. The crimes occurred on March 25, 1993.
His execution was scheduled Dec. 3, but postponed until at least January to allow for a hearing in Clallam County over new evidence, including an ex-prisoner’s testimony about what Stenson allegedly said in prison.
