McALESTER, Oklahoma: In its first lethal injection since a botched one last year, Oklahoma executed a convicted killer with a three-drug method also used by Florida for a punishment the same night.

Oklahoma inmate Charles Frederick Warner showed no physical signs of distress after the lethal drugs were administered, although he did say, “My body is on fire.” He was declared dead 18 minutes after the execution began.

Warner, 47, was put to death for killing an infant in 1997. He was originally scheduled to be executed in April on the same night as Clayton Lockett, who began writhing on the gurney, moaning and trying to lift his head after he’d been declared unconscious. That prompted state officials to impose a moratorium on executions in Oklahoma until an investigation was completed into what went wrong.

Midazolam also was used in problematic executions last year in Arizona and Ohio, however. Inmates snorted and gasped during those lethal injections that took longer than expected.

Oklahoma used the sedative midazolam as part of a three-drug method that had been challenged by Warner and other death row inmates as presenting a risk of pain and suffering that violated their constitutional rights.

States have been scrambling to find new combinations of lethal drugs after European pharmaceutical companies restricted their distribution to US states that use them for executions.

The execution came after a divided US Supreme Court in a 5-4 ruling said it wouldn’t consider an appeal over the drugs.

In a dissenting opinion, Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote that she believes questions about the effectiveness of the drugs are particularly important because of states’ increasing reliance on new and scientifically untested methods of execution.

Wearing gray prison scrubs and covered with a sheet up to his waist, Warner, bald and clean shaven, was strapped to a gurney with intravenous lines in both arms.

When asked before the execution began if he had any final words, Warner responded: “Before I give my final statement, I’ll tell you they poked me five times. It hurt. It feels like acid.”

Warner also apologized to his family for the pain he caused them and said: “I’m not a monster. I didn’t do everything they said I did.”

Witnesses said they saw slight twitching in Warner’s neck about three minutes after the lethal injection began. The twitching lasted about seven minutes until he stopped breathing.

Warner’s attorney, Madeline Cohen, who witnessed the execution, said in a statement there was no way to know if Warner suffered because the second drug, a paralytic, would have prevented him from moving.

“Because Oklahoma injected Mr. Warner with a paralytic tonight, acting as a chemical veil, we will never know whether he experienced the intense pain of suffocation and burning that would result from injecting a conscious person with rocuronium bromide and potassium chloride,” Cohen said.