Dr. Horace Garrison is a retired orthopedist and an on-staff executioner for the South Carolina prison Sam Temple is warden of. Garrison took the job of presiding over executions as a medical adviser as a favor due to his and Temple’s shared pastime of golf and Garrison being out of a job due to his carpel tunnel syndrome. His daughter Mandy also suffered a severe meth addiction from coming across bad crowds of other dealers and addicts, so Dr. Garrison had her charged, convicted, and moved to a New York prison for serving her time and finding a halfway house for treatment.
The execution of family killer Lionel Hartigan didn’t happen, as it went awry when Garrison personally administered the chemicals, but the drugs didn’t fully enter Hartigan’s bloodstream. Hartigan spasmed, lost oxygen to his brain, and was left permanently vegetative. His brother Shane sued over Hardigan’s rights being violated, but the father and grandfather of the family murdered, Jamie Yost, tracked Garrison to an orthopedic convention and demanded to see him. Garrison avoided a confrontation by giving Dr. Mark Burns his room as a presumed courtesy since he didn’t get admitted before bookings were closed. Yost broke into the room and murdered Dr. Barns from mistaking him for Garrison.
Garrison originally denied his understanding of the motives, but his records to South Carolina were tracked, and his illicit work was found out. Yost was arrested once identified as the killer, and when Garrison refused to testify to motive, the prosecution had him arrested and ousted, blackmailing him with charges of murder from executing Moses LeSalle and Levon Pennybaker before their appeals were fully evaluated. Yost’s attorney tried to shock the jury with the cruel reality of the death penalty to argue a PTSD incompetence defense. In the end, Yost felt he wouldn’t convince the jury and agreed to a plea, making the D.A.’s office swear to penalize Garrison.
Garrison’s legal status for his actions is left unknown and ambiguous. (L&O: “Executioner”)