BONNE TERRE, Mo. (AP): A Missouri inmate has been put to death for killing two people during a restaurant robbery in 1998.  One of those victims was Fort Wayne truck driver Dennis Poyser.

Forty-year-old Earl Ringo Jr. was executed Wednesday, the eighth person put to death in Missouri this year and the 10th since November.

The Department of Corrections said he was executed at 12:22 a.m. by lethal injection.

Ringo and an accomplice killed Poyser  and manager trainee JoAnna Baysinger at a Ruby Tuesday restaurant in the early hours of July 4, 1998. Both were shot to death at point-blank range.

Courts and Gov. Jay Nixon refused to halt the execution.

Ringo's attorneys questioned Missouri's use of a pre-execution sedative. They said the drug, midazolam, could dull his senses and leave him unable to express any pain or suffering during the process.