By AP
McAlester, OK – Convicted Okla. killer to be put to death Thursday
McALESTER, Okla. (AP) An Oklahoma death row inmate convicted of killing a man in Miami in 1994 is to be put to death this week.
Forty-nine-year-old Gary Roland Welch is scheduled for execution at 6 p.m. Thursday at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary for the beating and stabbing death of Robert Dean Hardcastle.
Welch has maintained that he killed Hardcastle in self-defense. The state Pardon and Parole Board voted 3-2 on Dec. 5 to deny Welch's request for clemency.
Welch was hospitalized in mid-December after prison officials say he tried to kill himself by cutting his neck with razors.
Welch is now being housed in the prison infirmary where warden's assistant Terry Crenshaw told the McAlester News-Capital that he's being monitored 24 hours a day.