Oklahoma's 5th execution of 2022 scheduled Thursday
Nov. 16—An Oklahoma County man convicted for the 1995 murder of a 3-year-old is scheduled to be executed Thursday on his 63rd birthday.
Richard Fairchild will be Oklahoma's fifth death row inmate executed this year pending any last-minute legal action.
Oklahoma parole board denied Fairchild clemency in a 4-1 vote Oct. 12 for his 1996 conviction of first-degree murder in the murder of his girlfriend's 3-year-old son Adam Broomhall.
Oklahoma Attorney General John O' Connor called Fairchild's death sentence a "just and appropriate punishment."
"Adam Broomhall was just three years old when his mother's boyfriend, Richard Stephen Fairchild, brutally tortured him to death on Nov. 13, 1995, for wetting the bed," he said in a press release. "Fairchild, a former amateur boxer, beat, burned, and threw Adam into the side of a table, silencing his cries forever. Ultimately, an Oklahoma jury decided death was the just and appropriate punishment for the horrific murder of Adam. The conviction and sentence were affirmed after years of thorough reviews by the appellate courts."
Attorneys for Fairchild argued he suffers from mental illness and is greatly impaired because of numerous traumas to his brain throughout his life which has led to organic brain syndrome.
Records from the Oklahoma Department of Corrections presented by Fairchild's attorneys show that Fairchild suffered from delusions in 2014 and believed his family was controlling his execution date and that he was going to inherit millions of dollars after several family members allegedly died.
"As Richard Fairchild's brain has deteriorated, he has descended into psychosis, a fact well-documented in his prison records," Fairchild's attorney Emma Rolls said in a press release. "Yet despite having lost touch with reality, Richard remains remorseful for his crime and continues to have an unblemished prison record. There is no principled reason for Oklahoma to execute him."
Court records state Fairchild was drunk after drinking all day with the boy's mother at a residence in Del City when Broomhall woke up crying. Prosecutors stated Fairchild began to beat the boy and burned both sides of Broomhall's body by pressing him against a furnace.
Fairchild then threw the child into a dining table that knocked the child unconscious, court records state. Investigators determined the child died from blunt force trauma after suffering four to six blows to the head and another 26 blows to the body.
Fairchild is one of 25 executions the state of Oklahoma plans to conduct through December 2024.
James Coddington and Benjamin Cole were the first two executed under the current plan that started in August 2022. Donald Anthony Grant and Gilbert Ray Postelle were executed by the state in early 2022.
The Dec. 8 execution of Richard Glossip was stayed by Gov. Kevin Stitt for 60 days to allow the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals time to review pending court matters. Glossip's execution is currently scheduled for Feb. 16, 2023.
John Hanson is scheduled to be executed Dec. 15, but is in the custody of the U.S. Bureau of Prisons. The state of Oklahoma is suing for custody of Hanson to carry out the execution after the transfer was denied by BOP and stating the transfer "is not in the public interest." Hanson's Nov. 9 clemency hearing was cancelled due to Hanson not being in state custody.
The state of Oklahoma has 11 executions scheduled for 2023, with September being the only month without an execution scheduled.
Contact Derrick James at djames@mcalesternews.com
