Harley Lappin, warden of the federal penitentiary, broke the news in a simple and formal manner.”The court order to execute Timothy McVeigh has been fulfilled,” he said, his face grey and drawn. “Pursuant to the sentence of the US district court, Timothy James McVeigh has been executed by lethal injection.” He added, “Inmate McVeigh did not make any final statement.” Instead, in the hours before his death, he had sat in his cell copying out in a neat but rather child-like hand, the words of William Ernest Henley’s 1875 poem Invictus.The last lines say: “I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.” Was McVeigh the master of his fate? Those hoping that the “soldier” who talked of “collateral damage”, would finally show remorse, would have been disappointed. Aware that more than 200 bomb survivors and victims’ relatives were watching the CCTV in Oklahoma City, McVeigh tried to “take charge of the room and understand his circumstances”, according to one witness.McVeigh was brought in shackles into to the green-tiled death chamber at 7am, compliant and co-operative. He made no fuss as he was strapped into the plastic-covered adapted dentists’ chair, his body covered in a sheet that came halfway up his chest.There was one hitch. Ironically in this age of instant-hit technology, the CCTV feed was not working properly.

A couple of minutes later, the problem sorted, Mr Lappin announced: “We are ready.” The curtains were drawn back and McVeigh raised his head, strained his neck and tried to look at those who were in the witness rooms.Mr Lappin turned to Fred Anderson, a US Marshal and the only other person in the death chamber, and said: “Marshal, we are ready. May we proceed?” Mr Anderson called the operations room of the Justice Department, then put down the receiver and replied: “Warden, we may proceed with the execution.” The first of the three drugs was administered through an IV inserted into his right leg at 7.10. The line, coming from another room, jerked slightly as the sodium pentothal started to flow The other two drugs followed in quick succession. Witnesses said McVeigh’s eyes went glassy, his skin a shade of pale yellow.And then at about 7.15am, Mr Lappin announced over the loudspeakers, “Inmate McVeigh died at 7.14am.” In Oklahoma City, 232 bomb survivors and victims’ relatives had watched as a wide-screen TV relayed the CCTV feed. “I think I did see the face of evil today,” Kathy Wilburn, who two grandsons were killed, said afterwards.It is difficult to know what to make of all this, this surreal conclusion to a process designed to deal with a criminal that America had would have so much preferred to have been a fervent Islamic terrorist rather than a white, Roman Catholic from the US heartlands.What should one think of the manner in which McVeigh was destined to die? Outside the prison, Harold Smith, an anti-death penalty campaigner from Albany, New York, who had been at the same spot for three days, had this view: “It makes a mockery of the words ‘civilised nation’.”.

When survivors of the blast that destroyed the Alfred P Murrah building in 1995 gathered yesterday to watch the execution of its perpetrator, Timothy McVeigh, on closed- circuit TV, they all noticed the same thing. They saw his eyes swivelling up to the camera suspended from the ceiling above him just before he died. When survivors of of the blast that destroyed the Alfred P Murrah building in 1995 gathered yesterday to watch the execution of its perpetrator, Timothy McVeigh, on closed- circuit TV, they all noticed the same thing. They saw his eyes swivelling up to the camera suspended from the ceiling above him just before he died.The survivors, about 230 of them, were in Oklahoma City. It was their town that was traumatised when the explosion ripped the front off the building, killing 168 people.

McVeigh was being dispatched in Terre Haute, Indiana, 620 miles away. But that glance into the camera made the miles melt.”The stare said volumes,” commented Larry Whicher, who was among the witnesses in Oklahoma City and whose 40-year-old brother, Alan, was killed in the explosion He said the eyes seemed to be “coal black. He had a look of defiance, as if he would do it again.”Karen Jones, whose husband, Larry, 46, was killed, said McVeigh “just gave us that same glare that makes me think he got what he wanted. I was thinking he was really scared and he was really evil.” Kathy Wilburn, who lost two grandsons, said: “I think I did see the face of evil today.”The US Attorney General, John Ashcroft, received a standing ovation from those gathered to witness the execution.

He spoke to them before the television screens were switched on and the proceedings got under way. “He told us how sorry he was that we had to go through what we were,” said Oneta Johnson, whose mother died in the attack.As the witnesses came one at a time to a microphone afterwards to share their experience with the gathered media, their emotions seemed mixed. Some confessed almost to disappointment ­ that McVeigh had seemed simply to go to sleep, as if they would have preferred more gore. When the announcement came that McVeigh was dead, some of the witnesses sobbed, others clapped their hands.”What I saw wasn’t what I expected,” admitted Rudy Guzman, who lost a brother in the blast.