Hoka Hey, Hey, Hey. Goodbye.

Clarence Ray Allen tried to tell us he was too old and feeble to be executed.  Allen's lawyers described their client - at 76, the oldest ever to be executed in California - as not only aged, but blind, mostly deaf, diabetic, and unable to walk.

Yet early this morning, as the state finally disposed of Allen, the multiple child murderer proved a tougher bit of evil to put down than he would've had us believe.

Having walked to his execution gurney in San Quentin under his own power, then staring out at and nodding to witnesses, Allen required a second dose of potassium chloride when the first one failed to kill him.

"Basically, this guy's heart has been beating for 76 years, and it took awhile for it to stop," [Warden Steven Ornoski] explained. Two other executions have required the same treatment.
...
"Hoka Hey, it's a good day to die," Allen, who turned 76 on Monday, wrote in his last statement, handed to the warden after his last meal of buffalo steak, pecan pie and black walnut ice cream. "Hoka Hey" is a traditional Indian saying meaning, "It's a good day to die."

Those whose lives he savaged by ordering up the shotgun deaths of their loved ones in Fresno in 1980 looked as if they couldn't have agreed more.