
Death Row – Last words of every Texas inmate executed since 1982 - bpafonso
http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/death_row/dr_executed_offenders.html
======
mherdeg
Note that this text is in some cases censored. See Cameron Todd Willingham's
statement:

"Yeah. The only statement I want to make is that I am an innocent man -
convicted of a crime I did not commit. I have been persecuted for 12 years for
something I did not do. From God's dust I came and to dust I will return - so
the earth shall become my throne. I gotta go, road dog. I love you Gabby.
[Remaining portion of statement omitted due to profanity.]"

The full text is in fact pretty profane; see
[http://www.theawl.com/2009/12/cameron-todd-willinghams-
real-...](http://www.theawl.com/2009/12/cameron-todd-willinghams-real-last-
words) .

The New Yorker article which lays out the case for Willingham's innocence
omits the latter half of the statement entirely — see last paragraph of
[http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/07/090907fa_fact_...](http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2009/09/07/090907fa_fact_grann)
.

~~~
josai
I find it profoundly dissonant that, while reporting the last words of people
who were then legally murdered by the state (an inexcusable, brutal injustice,
to my mind), the functionaries responsible yet found prissiness enough to cut
out the swear words.

State-sanctioned murder? No problemo! A couple of swear words in the victim's
dying breaths? Woah, hold it right there - there might be children present.

Unbelievable.

~~~
godzilla82
Reminds me of Apocalypse Now. Kurtz: We train young men to drop fire on
people, but their commanders won't allow them to write "fuck" on their
airplanes because it's obscene!

------
rohansingh
This one really hit me:

> The act I committed to put me here was not just heinous, it was senseless.
> But the person that committed that act is no longer here - I am. I'm not
> going to struggle physically against any restraints. I'm not going to shout,
> use profanity or make idle threats. Understand though that I'm not only
> upset, but I'm saddened by what is happening here tonight. I'm not only
> saddened, but disappointed that a system that is supposed to protect and
> uphold what is just and right can be so much like me when I made the same
> shameful mistake. If someone tried to dispose of everyone here for
> participating in this killing, I'd scream a resounding, "No." I'd tell them
> to give them all the gift that they would not give me...and that's to give
> them all a second chance. I'm sorry that I am here. I'm sorry that you're
> all here. I'm sorry that John Luttig died. And I'm sorry that it was
> something in me that caused all of this to happen to begin with. Tonight we
> tell the world that there are no second chances in the eyes of
> justice...Tonight, we tell our children that in some instances, in some
> cases, killing is right. This conflict hurts us all, there are no SIDES. The
> people who support this proceeding think this is justice. The people that
> think that I should live think that is justice. As difficult as it may seem,
> this is a clash of ideals, with both parties committed to what they feel is
> right. But who's wrong if in the end we're all victims? In my heart, I have
> to believe that there is a peaceful compromise to our ideals. I don't mind
> if there are none for me, as long as there are for those who are yet to
> come. There are a lot of men like me on death row - good men - who fell to
> the same misguided emotions, but may not have recovered as I have. Give
> those men a chance to do what's right. Give them a chance to undo their
> wrongs. A lot of them want to fix the mess they started, but don't know how.
> The problem is not in that people aren't willing to help them find out, but
> in the system telling them it won't matter anyway. No one wins tonight. No
> one gets closure. No one walks away victorious.

[http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/death_row/dr_info/beazleynapoleo...](http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/death_row/dr_info/beazleynapoleonlast.html)

~~~
adamio
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon_Beazley](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon_Beazley)

Crime committed age 17, executed at 25

~~~
aet
Interesting from Wiki: victim was the father of a Federal Judge, J. Michael
Luttig. During his appeals to the U.S. Supreme Court, three of the nine
justices recused themselves because of their personal ties to Judge Luttig,
leaving six justices to review the case. Justice Antonin Scalia recused
himself because Luttig had clerked for him, while Justices David Souter and
Clarence Thomas recused themselves from the decision because Luttig had led
the George H. W. Bush Administration's successful effort to gain U.S. Senate
confirmation for them to the Supreme Court

------
vowelless
The title should be " ... of every inmate executed in Texas since 1982."

From reddit [1], here is a word cloud:

[http://imgur.com/t61UIgH](http://imgur.com/t61UIgH)

[1]
[http://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/26rui7/oc_a...](http://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/26rui7/oc_a_word_cloud_of_all_the_final_words_spoken_and/)

~~~
nsxwolf
Interesting comment on that word cloud:

"Wonder what their victims word cloud would look like? "Mercy" "Please" "I'm
begging" "I want my Mommy!" "Help""

~~~
imdsm
You have an additional speech mark at the end of that sentence.

> "Help""

~~~
TallGuyShort
He nested quotes. The entire line was wrapper in quotation marks, as well as
the individual quotes inside the line. </ocd>

~~~
arjunnarayan
My brain is throwing all sorts of parse errors at that quote full of quotes.
This is why we have escape characters! (Or, more realistically, two forms of
quotation marks for nesting).

~~~
TallGuyShort
Or separate symbols for the beginning and end of a quote, so nesting is
unambiguous. You know, something like:

(quote Wonder what their victims word cloud would look like? (quote Mercy)
(quote Please) (quote I'm begging) (quote I want my Mommy!) (quote Help))

Everyone just needs to learn s-expressions.

~~~
arjunnarayan
A professor collaborator of mine has the habit of saying "that does not
parse", or "that does not type-check" to nonsensical sentences uttered by
clueless research students (full disclosure, that set includes me). At first I
found it somewhat weird, but now I've grown to respect it. It totally makes
sense.

I remember in high school (when I was already a proficient programmer, but
still within-grade in the other sciecnes), struggling with some hard physics
problems, and running to my dad for help: he would always say: "dimensional
analysis". If only I had connected the dots: doing "dimensional analysis" in
your work is _exactly_ the same as type-checking your manually executed paper
algorithm. This lightbulb went off in my head approximately a decade too
late...

~~~
ArkyBeagle
We repeated dimensional analysis in my first physics class until _everybody_
got it ( all six of us... ).

------
moron4hire
When California released a similar database a few years ago, it completely
convinced me of the horrific barbarism that capital punishment is. It is no
deterrent to crime, and the risk of killing not just innocent people, but
genuinely reformed people, is far, far too great.

~~~
crusso
Yeah, a list like this tugs at your humanity.

Then again, these people wantonly killed others (as judged by juries and
appeals judges and governors).

Where are the last words of their victims?

[edited for clarity]

~~~
k-mcgrady
Regardless of how horrific their crimes were we can never really be certain
enough of their guilt to kill them. Nor should we give our government power to
kill its citizens. I don't know how anyone can believe the death penalty to be
a good idea.

1\. Look at the countries America is in company with in allowing capital
punishment - it's not a list any country should want to be a part of.

2\. Imagine yourself as an innocent person on death row. It's very likely
there have been people in that situation[1]. Do you still think it should be
allowed?

[1]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrongful_execution](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wrongful_execution)

~~~
crusso
_Regardless of how horrific their crimes were we can never really be certain
enough of their guilt to kill them_

That's a strange thing to say categorically. So if we have a lot of witnesses,
video, a manifesto of motive, physical evidence, etc... we can't be certain
enough to feel that someone should be permanently removed from the world?

~~~
k-mcgrady
IMO no. Witnesses can lie, video can be manipulated, physical evidence can be
tampered with. Obviously we can be very close to certain but unless we are
100% certain (which I don't think is possible) killing someone is a big risk.

------
massysett
This list is yet another example of how the condemned receive something that
neither their victims nor most other convicts get: a ceremonial death. They
get last words. A last meal. Last rites with the clergy. Candlelight vigil by
those against capital punishment. Final appeals to the courts and to the
governor for clemency. Witnesses to the execution. To rot in obscurity would
be greater punishment for these people. Instead they get to go out as
celebrities, complete with profiles on an official government website.
Disgusting.

~~~
gambiting
Disgusting as it may be, there are only a few options here, and none of them
are going to make everyone happy.

If you leave them to rot in prison like you suggested, people are going to be
upset that the society is paying to keep them alive(surely it would be better
to get rid of them?)

If you eventually execute them like some countries do now, some people(like
you) are upset that we make a show out of it - we don't. If one occurs it's a
result of a judicial system that takes years to reach a final decision,and
then we are "too humane" to just shoot people in the head without giving them
the last meal.

And of course there is the last option of executing people on the spot -
caught a child molester during the act? Why not shoot them right there, it is
literally saving the taxpayer millions in costs of trials, judges,lawyers etc.
No one can argue that it would not be a huge saving for the society. But I
think we can do better than dispensing justice on a whim. As much as I enjoy
Judge Dredd comics, I would not like to live in his universe.

Also, one could argue that a much better system would be about
rehabilitation,not punishment, and in such system death sentence is simply not
needed.

~~~
lmm
> If you leave them to rot in prison like you suggested, people are going to
> be upset that the society is paying to keep them alive(surely it would be
> better to get rid of them?)

I've heard that execution as practiced in the US today is more expensive than
life imprisonment.

~~~
pawn
I know a lot of people who would be okay with us going the cheaper route of
putting a bullet in their head rather than the more costly method of
injection.

~~~
chrisbennet
Its not the injection that makes it expensive. Its the years of legal costs.

------
onassar
Average age is around 39

    
    
      var ages = [],
          sum = 0;
      $('tr').each(function(a,b) {
          var age = $(b).find('td:nth-child(7)').text();
          if (age !== '') {
              ages.push(age);
              sum += parseInt(age);
          }
      });
      console.log(sum / ages.length);
    

Returns 39.10679611650485

~~~
apta
No need to store a list of ages. A simple counter should suffice.

~~~
AustinDizzy
Or just count the number of <tr> elements and subtract one to account for the
table header. That's what I did to find the average race.

    
    
      $('tr').length-1

------
dobbsbob
Texas you don't get the death penalty for murder, you get it for committing a
second felony and murder. Rob Will is on Polunsky DR and likely innocent
considering he was handcuffed at the time, zero physical evidence, and his
partner confessed to the murder. DA is a stepping stone to governor and senate
there is much incentive for DAs to seek the death penalty due to all the media
attention these trials receive, propelling the DA into a household name. The
more inmates you kill the bigger your public profile.

~~~
baldfat
Wasn't aware of his case:

From the judge denying a new trail: “The questions raised during post-judgment
factual development about Will’s actual innocence create disturbing
uncertainties,” he wrote. “Federal law does not recognize actual innocence as
a mechanism to overturn an otherwise valid conviction.”

[http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/11/us/texas-death-row-
appeal-...](http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/11/us/texas-death-row-appeal-is-
more-than-a-matter-of-innocence.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0)

------
havo
467

> Yes, Tell my sister Tracey, I love you. Nicole, thank you and I love you.
> Wanda and all of my friends, I love you and thank you for your support. To
> the State of Texas, I am an innocent man. Never trust a court-appointed
> attorney. I am ready Warden. Thank you, Brad, I'm sorry. Check that DNA,
> check Scott. Here we go. Lord Jesus, Jesus.

~~~
baldfat
I know I shouldn't due to work BUT WOW this guy was clearly should have been a
death penalty case! You need a murder with a felony being committed. His
felony robbery of a day planner ("found" during the trail) and a missing
wallet. Medical Examiner clearly showed the man was innocent. The victim
defended herself and was violently beaten and wounded. Defendant had zero
wounds and no evidence of crime in his home or his car. Sick sick world.

[http://www.skepticaljuror.com/2011/05/impending-wrongful-
exe...](http://www.skepticaljuror.com/2011/05/impending-wrongful-execution-of-
cary.html)

~~~
baldfat
Clearly shouldn't be a death penalty case!

------
scrumper
I haven't got that far yet, but only one of the five statements I've read has
made any kind of apology, and he was already in prison at the time he
committed the crime for which he was executed (running over a corrections
officer in a stolen truck while trying to escape).

Also surprising to me was how many murders were committed for very little
potential gain: theft, escaping from a police officer while under arrest for a
petty crime; there's less headline-grabbing evil than I expected here (though
there is its share); it's mostly just a mixture of reflexive stupidity, greed,
and violence.

All in all quite an unsettling read.

~~~
dobbsbob
There's also 2 guys declared 'unfit to execute' yet they are still in solitary
on death row since the 70s

------
triangleman
We have a word cloud and a "greatest hits" list posted here.

Remember that this is more than 500 separate cases worthy of consideration or
at least having enough decency to hit the back button rather than dig into
such a heavy topic.

What's not cool is turning these words into a Top 10-linkbait list or a
variety show or some other mechanism for insulating yourself from the horror
of this post.

~~~
JoeAltmaier
Folks have published 'famous epitaph' books before - is this different? Of
course its black humor, all such topics are by definition. Is it just too
soon? If they had all been pre-1950 would that have softened the horror?

Or is it just that the Internet is way too slight of a medium to support Any
serious topic? I would tend to agree with that.

------
abandonliberty
>Oops! Google Chrome could not connect to www.tdcj.state.tx.us

I hope we did that.

>Try reloading:
www.­tdcj.­state.­tx.­us/­death_row/­dr_executed_offe­nders.­html

Wow, chrome actually thinks that out to google.com. Sneaky.

[http://www.google.com/url?sa=D&q=http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us...](http://www.google.com/url?sa=D&q=http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/death_row/dr_executed_offenders.html&usg=AFQjCNFrs1WvjG4EQEFSlnwgnvW7_8WisA)

------
swatthatfly
Can anybody explain why the Race column is stil there? What is the relevancy
of this statistic? Why not sex, or religion?

~~~
llamataboot
Because a disproportionate number of people sentenced to death are non-white.

~~~
lrm242
From the data:

    
    
      White    231 (44.9%)
      Black    190 (36.9%)
      Hispanic  92 (17.9%)
      Other      2 (0.4%)

~~~
kohanz
_As of the 2010 US Census, the racial distribution in Texas was as follows:
70.4% of the population of Texas was White American; 11.8% African American;
3.8%, Asian American; 0.7%, American Indian; 0.1%, native Hawaiian or Pacific
islander only; 10.5% of the population were of some other race only; and 2.7%
were of two or more races. Hispanics (of any race) were 37.6% of the
population of the state, while Non-Hispanic Whites composed 45.3%_ [0]

The Hispanic portion is difficult to parse, but it certainly seems that
African-Americans are very over-represented.

[0]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Texas#Racial_an...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Texas#Racial_and_ancestral_makeup)

------
dphnx
The New York Times ran an article[1] on this in 2009. Here are the last words
they picked out -

\---

Go ahead?

Nothing I can say can change the past.

I done lost my voice.

I would like to say goodbye.

My heart goes is going ba bump ba bump ba bump.

Is the mike on?

I don’t have anything to say. I am just sorry about what I did.

I am nervous and it is hard to put my thoughts together. Sometimes you don’t
know what to say.

Man, there is a lot of people there.

I have come here today to die, not make speeches.

Where’s Mr. Marino’s mother? Did you get my letter?

I want to ask if it is in your heart to forgive me. You don’t have to.

I wish I could die more than once to tell you how sorry I am.

Could you please tell that lady right there — can I see her? She is not
looking at me — I want you to understand something, hold no animosity toward
me. I want you to understand. Please forgive me.

I don’t think the world will be a better or safer place without me.

I am sorry.

I want to tell my mom that I love her.

I caused her so much pain and my family and stuff. I hurt for the fact that
they are going to be hurting.

I am taking it like a man.

Kick the tires and light the fire. I am going home.

They may execute me but they can’t punish me because they can’t execute an
innocent man.

I couldn’t do a life sentence.

I said I was going to tell a joke. Death has set me free. That’s the biggest
joke.

To my sweet Claudia, I love you.

Cathy, you know I never meant to hurt you.

I love you, Irene.

Let my son know I love him.

Tell everyone I got full on chicken and pork chops.

I appreciate the hospitality that you guys have shown me and the respect, and
the last meal was really good.

The reason it took them so long is because they couldn’t find a vein. You know
how I hate needles. ... Tell the guys on Death Row that I’m not wearing a
diaper.

Lord, I lift your name on high.

From Allah we came and to Allah we shall return.

For everybody incarcerated, keep your heads up.

Death row is full of isolated hearts and suppressed minds.

Mistakes are made, but with God all things are possible.

I am responsible for them losing their mother, their father and their
grandmother. I never meant for them to be taken. I am sorry for what I did.

I can’t take it back.

Lord Jesus forgive of my sins. Please forgive me for the sins that I can
remember.

All my life I have been locked up.

Give me my rights. Give me my rights. Give me my rights. Give me my life back.

I am tired.

I deserve this.

A life for a life.

It’s my hour. It’s my hour.

I’m ready, Warden.

\---

[1]
[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/opinion/20cameron.html?_r=...](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/20/opinion/20cameron.html?_r=3&)

~~~
dfc
I am curious why you pasted the entire list of last words from the NYT article
in addition to linking to the article? Why not provide a link to the article
(maybe a small relevant excerpt) and let people choose if they want stop
reading the comments here to read the NYT list?

~~~
cm2012
I personally appreciated the full paste - I generally dislike leaving HN
through links if I can.

------
wuliwong
The first one I read was already interesting. He talks about being at peace
and says a few nice things to his family and friends. The striking thing is
that he never mentions the murders he committed. He killed a 51 year old
woman, a 24 year old woman (daughter) and a 3 year old child (grandchild). All
were stabbed to death. I believe the 24 year old woman was his girlfriend at
the time. Saying your sorry, not sorry, or that you were innocent, I'd expect
that. But not saying anything at all it really odd.
[http://murderpedia.org/male.V/v/villegas-jose-
luis.htm](http://murderpedia.org/male.V/v/villegas-jose-luis.htm)

------
venkasub
Some charts from the data : [http://theuforce.blogspot.in/2014/05/visualizing-
executed-of...](http://theuforce.blogspot.in/2014/05/visualizing-executed-
offenders-in-texas.html)

------
erik_landerholm
Execution #492 [http://www.austinchronicle.com/news/2012-11-02/framing-
the-g...](http://www.austinchronicle.com/news/2012-11-02/framing-the-
guilty/all/)

Regardless of the truth, there are a lot of open questions and this man was
put to death with all these questions still not answered. This is not who we
should be.

------
nwardez
Here are some visualizations of this data set:

[http://vis.berkeley.edu/courses/cs294-10-fa13/wiki/index.php...](http://vis.berkeley.edu/courses/cs294-10-fa13/wiki/index.php/Assignment_1:_Visualization_Design)

This was an assignment in a Berkeley visualization class taught by Maneesh
Agrawala.

------
wbharding
Last statements are endlessly fascinating things. I hope that by the time I
die that tombstones will have flash storage built into them. You'll push a
button on the tombstone and out pops a holograph that projects whatever
message the person would like to share. I'd spend days in the cemetery.

------
bruceb
One of the best:

"Somebody needs to kill my trial attorney."

George Harris Executed in Missouri on September 13, 2000 for a murder.
[http://wgrd.com/the-weirdest-last-words-by-death-row-
inmates...](http://wgrd.com/the-weirdest-last-words-by-death-row-inmates/)

Clearly he didn't get a good lawyer.

~~~
mikeash
Maybe he scared away the good lawyers by threatening to murder them.

------
astrodust
The title for this is incorrectly applying the public suffix list
([https://publicsuffix.org/](https://publicsuffix.org/)) and comes up with
"tx.us". That's not the registered domain name here.

~~~
dfc

      // The registrar notes several more specific domains available in each state,
      // such as state.*.us, dst.*.us, etc., but resolution of these is somewhat
      // haphazard; in some states these domains resolve as addresses, while in others
      // only subdomains are available, or even nothing at all. We include the
      // most common ones where it's clear that different sites are different
      // entities.

------
toblender
I may go to hell for this...

[https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1K6LOJ8x1dP85CGAMjDwn...](https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1K6LOJ8x1dP85CGAMjDwnM8lSxzMagPNDNj6kDbTQ_ag/edit#gid=1671808171)

------
suthakamal
What a disgusting, morally bankrupt society that permits the state to take a
life. And then to censor statements? Damn. Nobody is claiming these were good
human beings, but disgust isn't nearly strong enough a word.

------
spang
Absolutely chilling. It disgusts me that we're still killing people for
killing people in the 21st century. I hope our descendants look back on this
the same way we look back at slavery today.

------
mdanger007
There are no atheists in foxholes... or on death row apparently.

~~~
javert
There are atheists in foxholes, though.

------
foxhill
that's.. oddly haunting.

------
vaadu
Many more should be added. Start with Aldrich Ames, Bernie Madoff and Robert
Hanssen.

