Arizona executes inmate who set a man on fire, killing him, in 2002 attack

FLORENCE, Ariz. (AP) — An Arizona prisoner convicted of killing another man by throwing gasoline at him and lighting a match was put to death Wednesday, the first of three executions planned this week around the U.S.

Leroy Dean McGill, 63, was pronounced dead at 10:26 a.m. PT following a lethal injection at the Arizona State Prison Complex in Florence, corrections officials said. McGill drew the death penalty for his murder conviction in the killing of Charles Perez, who was attacked with his girlfriend in a north Phoenix apartment on July 13, 2002.

John Barcello, deputy director of the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry said McGill’s last meal included onion rings, bread and butter, chocolate cake and a green salad. He quoted McGill’s last words as: “I just want to thank everyone for being so accommodating and nice.”

“Today’s process went according to plan,” Barcello said.

Media witness Josh Kelety from The Associated Press said he heard McGill at one point say: “I’m going home soon.”

Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes, whose office pressed for the execution, said: “My thoughts today are with the family and the loved ones of Charles Perez and Nova Banta.”

“That process went swimmingly. I didn’t see any issue at all finding a vein on either arm,” said media witness Sean Rice from Phoenix television station KPNX. Rice said he observed a slight twitching on the right side of McGill’s head about four minutes before time of death.

Authorities said McGill threw the gasoline and a lit match at Perez and Perez’s girlfriend, Nova Banta, as they sat on a sofa in a north Phoenix apartment on July 13 of that year. Perez and Banta had accused McGill of stealing a gun from the apartment before the attack. At the time, McGill was using methamphetamine and hadn’t slept in several days.

Banta survived the attack, but Perez died.

Twelve people have been executed so far this year in the United States. Tennessee and Florida each are scheduled to carry out an execution Thursday.

At the Arizona trial, Banta testified that McGill told her and Perez not to talk behind people’s backs. Before they could respond, McGill lit them on fire, authorities said.

Perez and Banta ran out of the apartment. Another man who lived in the apartment used a blanket to put out the flames on Banta, who suffered third-degree burns over three-quarters of her body. Perez died later at a hospital after suffering what prosecutors described as extreme pain.

Banta identified McGill as the attacker at trial.

Jurors deliberated for less than an hour before convicting McGill of murder in Perez’s death in October 2004. He also was convicted of attempted murder for attacking Banta, arson and endangerment of people who escaped without injuries when the fire forced them to flee the apartment and a nearby unit where flames spread.

McGill’s lawyers had argued for leniency by presenting evidence about abuse he suffered as a child as well as mental impairment and psychological immaturity. The jury ultimately returned the death sentence.

This spring, McGill’s lawyers made a last-ditch bid to get him resentenced, but a lower-court judge rejected it. The Arizona Supreme Court also declined a request from McGill’s lawyers to postpone the execution.

McGill, who declined an interview request from The Associated Press, waived his right to seek clemency.

Arizona last applied the death penalty in 2025, executing Richard Kenneth Djerf for the 1993 killings of four members of a Phoenix family and Aaron Gunches for the 2002 fatal shooting of his girlfriend’s ex-husband.

The state carried out three executions in 2022 following a nearly eight-year hiatus brought on by difficulties obtaining execution drugs and by criticism that a 2014 execution was botched. In that execution, Joseph Wood was injected with 15 doses of a two-drug combination over two hours, leading him to snort repeatedly and gasp hundreds of times before he died.

The state’s execution protocol calls for administering two syringes of the sedative pentobarbital, according to the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry.

With McGill’s death, Arizona now has 108 prisoners on death row. ___ Billeaud reported from Phoenix.

Jacques Billeaud And Josh Kelety, The Associated Press