Arizona plans to execute first prisoner in nearly eight years

Clarence Dixon is set to die on Wednesday morning (Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Re-entry/AP)

An Arizona man convicted of killing a college student in 1978 is scheduled to become the first person to be executed in the state after a nearly eight-year hiatus in its use of the death penalty.

Clarence Dixon, 66, is scheduled to die by lethal injection on Wednesday morning at the state prison in Florence for killing 21-year-old Arizona State University (ASU) student Deana Bowdoin.