Botched Executions in American History

REPORTS OF BOTCHED EXECUTIONS BY FIRING SQUAD

A report in the Salt Lake City Tribune takes a dif­fer­ent view of the sug­ges­tion that there have been no botched exe­cu­tions by firing squad.

From Hal Schindler, ​“Taylor’s Death Was Quick … But Some Weren’t So Lucky Executioner’s Song – a Utah Reprise,” in The Salt Lake City Tribune, January 28, 1996:*

But on May 16, 1879, a lack of restrain­ing straps result­ed in the most bizarre, grotesque and hor­ri­bly botched Utah exe­cu­tion on record. It was so dis­grace­ful that one news­pa­per, the Ogden Junction, sar­cas­ti­cal­ly remind­ed the state that ​“the French guil­lo­tine never fails.”

It all came about when Wallace Wilkerson, who killed a man in an argu­ment about a card game in Provo, was to face the fir­ing squad in a cor­ner of the jail yard. As the hour neared, Wilkerson strode from his cell dressed in black broad­cloth and wear­ing a white felt hat. In his left hand he car­ried a cig­ar, which remained with him to the last.

Witnesses noticed ​“he exhib­it­ed unmis­tak­able effects of liquor.” The con­demned man insist­ed on not being tied to the chair and he refused a blind­fold. ​“I give you my word,” he said, ​“I intend to die like a man, look­ing my exe­cu­tion­ers right in the eye.”

The sher­iff protest­ed, explain­ing that the sharp­shoot­ers would be con­cealed in a shed 20 feet dis­tant. Wilkerson plead­ed, and the sher­iff relent­ed. He placed a white, 3‑inch patch over the con­demned man’s heart, stepped back and sig­naled the shooters.

Wilkerson heard the mut­ed com­mand, ​“Ready, aim … ” and drew up his shoul­ders as if to brace him­self for the fatal moment. The guns fired; four heavy slugs tore into the con­demned man. With the impact, Wilkerson leaped out of the chair and jumped for­ward ​“five or six feet.” He crashed to the dirt and turned his head down­ward to his chest.

“Oh, my God! My God! They have missed,” he screamed.

A doc­tor and sev­er­al wit­ness­es rushed for­ward. As Wilkerson writhed on the ground in full view of some 20 spec­ta­tors, it became appar­ent the bul­lets had not struck his heart.

By straight­en­ing in his chair, he had raised the tar­get and the shoot­ers were mis­di­rect­ed. Three slugs touched the tar­get, but were well above the vital spot; the fourth bul­let struck six inch­es from the oth­ers and shat­tered Wilkerson’s left arm.

It was 27 min­utes before he could be pronounced dead.

In September 1951, Eliseo J. Mares became the sec­ond con­demned man to suf­fer the con­se­quences of a botched execution.

Mares was the first pris­on­er to be put to death in the new prison at the Point of the Mountain. The old pen­i­ten­tiary in Sugar House had been the exe­cu­tion site since 1900; before then the sen­tences were car­ried out in coun­ties where the crime took place.

When Mares was shot, news­pa­per sto­ries car­ried the barest of details. Not until 25 years lat­er, in a rem­i­nis­cence by one of the wit­ness­es, Salt Lake Tribune reporter Clark Lobb, was it dis­closed that Mares ​“died silent­ly and hor­ri­bly.” Two of the four bul­lets fired from 15 feet away struck Mares in the hip and abdomen. It was sev­er­al min­utes before the pris­on­er was declared dead.

*excerpts report­ed in Connor Friedersdorf, ​“Utah May Bring Back the Firing Squad,” in The Atlantic, March 11, 2015:

125 Years Ago, First Execution Using Electric Chair Was Botched

On August 6, 1890, New York exe­cut­ed William Kemmler. It was the first time ever a state used the elec­tric chair to car­ry out an exe­cu­tion. Proponents of elec­tro­cu­tion — includ­ing Thomas Edison — tout­ed the new method as quick, effec­tive, pain­less, and humane: the same argu­ments lat­er used by leg­is­la­tors to sup­port lethal injec­tion and exe­cu­tion by nitro­gen gas. In May 1890, the U.S. Supreme Court reject­ed Kemmler’s chal­lenge that the elec­tric chair was cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment. ​“Punishments are cru­el when they involve tor­ture or a lin­ger­ing death,” the Court wrote. But it said the New York leg­is­la­ture in enact­ing the elec­tric chair statute had intend­ed ​“to devise a more humane method” of exe­cu­tion and ​“presume[d] that the leg­is­la­ture was pos­sessed of the facts upon which it took action.” The exe­cu­tion pro­ceed­ed. According to the Buffalo News, Kemmler — who was intel­lec­tu­al­ly dis­abled — asked cor­rec­tions offi­cers: ​“Don’t let them exper­i­ment on me more than they ought to.” After an ini­tial 17-sec­ond admin­is­tra­tion of high-volt­age elec­tric cur­rent, a doc­tor declared Kemmler dead. Then Kemmler let out a deep groan and wit­ness­es report­ed­ly screamed ​“Turn on the cur­rent!” Reports of the exe­cu­tion say that ​“After 2 min­utes the exe­cu­tion cham­ber filled with the smell of burn­ing flesh. 2 of the wit­ness­es faint­ed. Several oth­ers were over­come with severe attacks of nau­sea.” Newspapers called the exe­cu­tion a ​“his­toric bun­gle” and ​“dis­gust­ing, sick­en­ing and inhu­man.” States have car­ried out 158 exe­cu­tions by elec­tric chair since 1973. 10 were botched. Virginia was the most recent state to use the elec­tric chair, exe­cut­ing Robert Gleason in January 2013. 

(S. Meehan, ​“Aug. 6, 1890: Buffalo man is first to be exe­cut­ed by elec­tric chair,” The Buffalo News, Aug. 6, 2015; ​“Kemmler’s Death by Torture,” New York Herald, Aug. 7, 1890; In re Kemmler, 136 U.S. 436 (1890).) See History of the Death Penalty and Methods of Execution.