Major Crimes and True Crime

How people on death row act on the day of their execution According to some Death Row people I have corresponded with, people are generally quiet and perhaps reflective on their final day. They know exactly how the day will end for them, and they know (in virtually every case) that there is no possibility of reprieve or postponement. They have had plenty of time to write final letters or notes or poems or anything else, so there is no hurried scribbling. There are no maudlin farewells and forgivenesses or confessions. No wailing or crying all day. No pronouncing curses, no swearing, no angry outbursts, no complaints about unfairness or innocence. Generally, no conversations except perhaps with a priest or other religious figure. While every person approaches his execution in his own way, people generally are stoic about it. Some read a Bible or other holy book. Some pray, generally silently. No one tries to be humorous or heroic or memorable. They just wait, patiently, for the end...

Death row inmate chooses to be executed by firing squad over the electric chair A man sentenced to death in South Carolina has chosen to be executed by firing squad rather than the electric chair, which would make him the first death row inmate to die by firing squad in the state. Richard Bernard Moore, 57, would also be the first person executed in South Carolina in more than a decade, as the state has struggled to procure the drugs required to perform lethal injection. Moore, who was sentenced to death for the 1999 murder of a convenience store clerk, is set to be executed on April 29. In a court filing Friday, Moore chose to die by firing squad but added in a statement he will not lose hope in two pending court challenges to the constitutionality of the state's death penalty methods. "I believe this election is forcing me to choose between two unconstitutional methods of execution, and I do not intend to waive any challenges to electrocution or firing squad by making a...

Reasons why the Germans Shoot Female Russian Soldiers on Sight Stories about military history often focus on battlefield tactics and strategy. When they do focus on people, it is usually on a male soldier. However, during WWII, the Germans often executed female soldiers on sight. This is doubly amazing because it suggests women were a significant part of the fighting forces and that they provoked a visceral reaction from the Germans who captured them. Ancient battlefields were often just outside their city walls, and rulers formed armies composed of people who were normally peace-time farmers. With limited manpower, the bulk of the conscripts were needed for fighting. The remaining camp followers transported supplies, prepared the food, and performed other non-combat functions in order to maximize the availability of men for combat. Soviet soldiers of the Eastern Front during a short rest after fighting, 1 April 1944. The lack of weapons and armor for camp followers allowed them t...

Reasons why execution by hanging still exist Because it works and it is not complicated to do. All you need is a strong enough rope and a strong enough support to hang it from - no more technology than that. No drugs or gas the supplier can cut off the supply of, no high-voltage electric generator, no guns, just a simple rope. It also happens to be a very quick method if done by the measured long drop. This was invented in the UK. If the rope is too short, the prisoner strangles slowly, and if it is too long, there is the risk of ripping his head off. So the key point with this is to calculate the right length of drop according to the prisoner’s weight. Get this right (and British executioners were good at doing the sums) and the prisoner dies almost instantly of the hangman’s fracture - fracture of the second and third cervical vertebrae, which will also cut the spinal cord. The normal range of drops is between five and eight feet - a heavier prisoner needs a shorter drop as his...

Reasons Why the Nazis send Jews to the concentration camps and not just kill them on the spot I know a lot of Jews were shot and killed in their homes and on the streets but there is also a large majority of them that got sent to the camps. Why go through all that trouble if they were going to be killed anyways? I know Nazis used the Jews as a slave labour force too but did they also pull women and children into slavery too? Because if they didn’t, then I don’t see why the Nazis wouldn’t have just shot them outright.  Feel like I need to declare that I’m not a holocaust denier nor a Neo-Nazi, just genuinely curious why the Nazis chose to commit genocide the way they did.  Two reasons First, maintaining cooperation.  They gradually moved the Jews out of their homes to concentration camps and the Jews complied.  If they just started shooting them the Jews would flee or fight back.   Second, because it was too hard on the people doing the killing.  T...

'Child kidnapper' jumps off balcony onto car roof - and right into the clutches of angry crowd armed with sticks Watch The Video   Out of the frying pan into the fire - man made jump for it after the child's mother snatched daughter back but could only land right in front of furious armed gang An alleged child kidnapper jumped off an apartment block balcony and landing on a car roof in a dramatic moment which was caught on camera. But even then his getaway was thwarted when he ran into a group of waiting neighbours, all armed with sticks. The man, from Foshan in China's Guangdong Province, has been accused of attempting to snatch a six-year-old girl from the building.  It is believed that the girl's mother noticed him in the corridor of the residential building as he tried to grab the child. The girl's mother immediately fought off the suspected kidnapper and took her child back. During the incident, she managed to capture the attention of the neighbours b...

How the process of an execution by gas chamber, in the U.S., looks like I wasn’t a pleasant way to die. It had to be very emotional and stressful despite an inmate waiting for the execution for a long time. First, the inmate was sent to have a shower. After the shover he got the clothes. In the past, they often gave a white shirt , black pants to men and a skirt to women. But in the modern era, were inmates executed in a one colour prison uniform. The inmate could have his last call, last meal, and write a goodbye letter. According to many resources, they probably didn’t give to the inmate any shoes after the shower. That’s because inmates in a gas chamber were executed barefooted. So he had to go the whole way from the cell to the gas chamber without shoes so they often put a carpet on the floor to don’t let the inmate walk on cold concrete as he had bare feet. When they entered the gas chamber, guards strapped the inmate to the chair and asked him to say his last words. Then the...

Reasons why capital punishment was removed from the UK At one point the United Kingdom had no less than 220 crimes that were punishable by death, and included such monstrous behavior as "being in the company of Gypsies for one month", "strong evidence of malice in a child aged 7–14 years of age," "blacking the face or using a disguise whilst committing a crime," and theft of any object worth more than 12 pence. The law in question was called the Bloody Code. Most of this had to do with the wealthy trying to deter crimes against property, although I'm not sure how executing children for "strong evidence of malice" was supposed to help anything. Anyway, in time people got sick of it, and Europeans in general were especially sick of executions after the Second World War, when vast numbers of people were legally murdered by the Nazis. In 1950 a Welshman named Timothy Evans was tried and hanged for the murder of his wife and baby daughter, an...

The horrific execution of Clayton Lockett by lethal injection this spring in Oklahoma took an astonishing 43 minutes to complete. Together with other botched killings, the incident has focused attention on the inexperience and incompetence that now accompanies many executions in America.  "After he died, an autopsy showed potentially toxic levels of the drug in his system, suggesting he also attempted an overdose before he was executed."   So he might have done this to himself with the drug reaction issue.  Who knows if it would have been this bad if he hadn't attempted to OD first.   But if you read about what he did to that girl, he deserved every second of that agony.  He buried a girl alive for shit's sake! Guillotines have moving parts and require mechanical maintenance and lubrication (plenty of failed beheading by guillotine in France when it was in vogue), they're also needlessly bloody when a bag of nitrogen accomplishes the same goal. ...

Reasons why death row prisoners executed at Midnight I used to wonder why executions were held at or as close to midnight on the date of the death warrant. I did some research awhile back and spoke to several corrections officers and one warden. Executions are very difficult emotionally on prison personnel and the other prisoners in general. They have had time to get to know these people up close and personal—not about their crimes, but their wives, children and family. In short, they have become humanized waiting for their sentences to be carried out and they will be taking part in ending their lives. During the late hours, the prison is quieter, other prisoners are asleep and locked down. A “rehearsal” is conducted the day before an execution so each person will know his or her role in the process. It is a very sad state of affairs when a life is taken after having known the person for years on end. When a woman is in the holding cell, it is doubly difficult for the prison. If y...

Reasons why France use the guillotine as a method of capital punishment Originally? Because it was the most painless way to kill someone. The inventor, Dr. Joseph-Ignace Guillotin, was very clear about his intention to botched and painful executions. In an era before firearms and pharmaceutical solutions, the quickest way to execute someone was to chop of their head. That, itself, was a nod to civility, as the alternative was something like hanging (which could result in slow strangulation) or other methods that were actually intended to be as long and painful as possible. Beheading might look gruesome, but it’s definitive and it’s quick. (People still argue over whether it’s actually painless or not, but it was clearly as quick a method as they had). The problem was, you were depending on the skill of the headsman. Taking off someone’s head with a single blow is very difficult, and it wasn’t uncommon for executions to require more than one hit, and end up being unnecessarily trau...

How scared are people who are about to be executed There have been a wide range of emotional responses from those facing execution, from extreme fear to surprising calmness. Some individuals show bravado or acceptance, while others experience panic or seek spiritual comfort in their final moments. Carl Panzram, a notorious serial killer in the U.S., was caught, tried and sentenced to death. When the hangman was fitting the noose over his head, Panzram remarked, “Hurry up, you bastard, I could kill a dozen men with my bare hands while you are fooling around.” He was more worried about the safety of the executioner than for himself! Carl Panzram Irma Grese was a female SS guard, and has caused untold atrocities to Jewish and other women in Nazi camps such as Bergen-Belsen, Ravensbruck and Auschwitz. That awful woman was sentenced to death by hanging by a British Military Court in 1946. Upon execution, she was also recorded as saying to the executioner, “Hurry, please. Hurry.” In a h...

There is a video footage of concentration camps taken by the Nazis before they were liberated I know this sounds morbid... but I like to learn about history, even when the subject matter covers heinous atrocities like the holocaust. I’ve always been curious about this since the only footage I’ve seen seems to have been taken by the soldiers who liberated the camps (heartbreaking footage of things like the mass graves, piles of shoes, bones in gas chambers, etc) but I feel like this is definitely something the nazis would have documented and while I’m sure they destroyed some evidence of it, I’m doubtful they were able to get rid of all of it. So, does footage like this exist? Where would one who is interested in the history of the holocaust find such films? Making photos and films of any camps or executions was generally forbidden without permission. Permission was sometimes given, however. First of all, when the Nazis wanted to produce propaganda. The Theresienstadt propaganda fo...

Reasons why Eddie Slovik was executed for desertion during World War II while other deserter's sentences were reduced Why was Eddie Slovik executed for desertion during World War ll while other deserter's sentences were reduced?  while watching the American Heroes Channe,  I heard about Norman Cota and went to Wikipedia to learn more. I came across Eddie Slovik, who | learned was a World War Il deserter through links from Cota's page. As I was readingl I came across this: Colonel Robert C. Bard of the judge advocates general's office noted that of the 2,864 army personnel tried for desertion for the period January 1942 through June 1948, 49 were convicted and sentenced to death, and 48 of those sentences were voided by higher authority. Norman Cota approved the death sentence, and Slovik later, I wrote Eisenhower a letter. Eisenhower confirmed the execution citing the necessity of discouraging other deserters. So why was only Slovik chosen to be executed? There wer...

The True Story Behind The Dark Wizard, HBO's Docuseries About Free Climber Dean Potter On the evening of May 16, 2015, Dean Potter and fellow climber Graham Hunt stood atop Taft Point, a granite overlook thousands of feet above Yosemite Valley. Below them, the valley floor stretched into shadow. Far beneath the jump point was a narrow notch in a ridgeline, the kind of gap wingsuit flyers attempt to thread at speeds often exceeding 100 miles per hour. The margin for error was vanishingly small; so was the time they would have to correct it. The men jumped. For roughly 15 seconds, Potter, then 43, and Hunt, 29, moved through open air in wingsuits, their bodies held aloft by fabric webbing stretched between their arms and legs. Then both struck the rock wall; neither deployed a parachute. Both men died immediately upon impact. Hunt, a Yosemite local and Potter’s regular flying partner, had been regarded by those who knew him as a gifted wingsuit flyer, though during his five year...

Woman caught on CCTV admits keying cars in Buckie A woman has admitted keying cars in her Moray hometown of Buckie after footage of the vandalism went viral. Hazel Innes, 44, scratched the side of three cars while out walking her dog. One owner, Shona Coull, caught Innes in the act in January after setting up a CCTV camera outside her home. The video was viewed more than 500,000 times after it was posted online. Innes admitted vandalism at Elgin Sheriff Court. Sentence was deferred for reports. Ms Coull posted the 23-second video of her white BMW X3 being damaged on social media in the hope that someone would recognise the culprit.

Shocking! Doctor Caught On Camera Beating Patient On Operating Table During Surgery (Photos+Video) Watch the video   In what will come across as the highest level of unprofessionallism, a female doctor has been seen beating a patient while on the operating table. A horrific video has emerged from China of the moment a female doctor beats a patient on the operating table over an alleged dispute about medical bills. According to Daily Mail, the footage was said to be secretly filmed last September by nurses at the private hospital in Inner Mongolia’s Hohhot as they wanted to expose the doctor’s behaviour. But it wasn’t until March 8 that they gave it to a TV station to be shared among the public. It was thought that the female surgeon was trying to ask for more money from the patient who was already on the operating table. In the 60-second video that has been filmed using a hidden camera, the female patient is clearly in distress. She lies on the operation table wearing nothin...