A South Dakota prison inmate who claimed anti-gay juror bias was executed on Monday after the Supreme Court denied a last-minute appeal.

Charles Rhines was on death row in South Dakota for the 1992 murder of an employee in the course of a commercial burglary. Rhines stabbed the 22-year-old employee to death after he caught Rhines burglarizing a doughnut shop in Rapid City, Iowa.

“I am hopeful that this day is an opportunity for the family to move forward and now, that this phase is over, they can continue to heal,” South Dakota Attorney General Jason R. Ravnsborg said in a statement.

Ravnsborg said that Rhines died by lethal injection.

Rhines' last words were to the parents of his victim.

“Ed and Peggy Schaeffer, I forgive you for your anger and hatred towards me,” he reportedly said. “I pray to God that he forgives you for your anger and hatred towards me.”

Rhines had argued that he was sentenced to death rather than life in prison because he's gay.

Rhines' lawyers argued that some of the jurors in his case believed that he should not be sentenced to life in prison because as a gay man he would enjoy serving in a men's prison.

The jury sent a note to the judge asking whether, if sentenced to life without parole, Rhines would “be allowed to mix with the general inmate population,” be able to “brag about his crime to other inmates, especially new and/or young men,” enjoy “conjugal visits,” and whether he would “have a cellmate.”

LGBT legal group Lambda Legal said in a statement that it was troubled that the Supreme Court refused to take a look at Rhines' claims that the jury pool was biased.

“If our legal system allows antigay bias in jury deliberations, the integrity of our entire court system is undermined,” Lambda Legal's Ethan Rice said in a statement. “The death penalty is an irreversible and harsh misuse of government power. When it is applied in a biased manner, courts should take every possible opportunity to correct that wrong. In this case, no court has ever reviewed the evidence of antigay bias that occurred during jury deliberations in Mr. Rhines's sentencing.”