USA - Arizona. The U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay of execution for Daniel Wayne Cook, 49, white

The U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay of execution for Daniel Wayne Cook, 49, white, less than 24 hours before he was scheduled to die for killing a man and a teenage boy in 1987 after torturing and raping them for hours. The execution is now on hold until the Supreme Court makes a decision on an argument by Cook's lawyers that he received ineffective counsel during his post-conviction proceedings. His lawyers have said his initial lawyers failed to present evidence of extreme physical and sexual abuse in his childhood. The execution was set for 10 a.m. Tuesday. Cook's death warrant expires Wednesday morning. If the Supreme Court doesn't rule in time, a new warrant must be issued, and that could take weeks. He has acknowledged his guilt but has been arguing for a life sentence. He only recently was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and brain dysfunction stemming from abuses he suffered as a child, and the prosecutor who tried Cook in 1988 has said he would not have sought the death penalty had he known about it. Cook was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder in the July 1987 deaths of Kevin Swaney, 16, and Carlos Cruz-Ramos, 26.