Read Online Amazing True Stories of Execution Blunders by Geoffrey Abbott - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Geoffrey Abbott
Tags: History
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executioner, concealed from those in the death chamber, threw the switch, sending 1,000 volts surging through the victim. After seventeen seconds, during which observers reported smelling burning clothes and charred flesh, the power was switched off but then disaster struck, for, as reported in the New York World :
‘Suddenly the man’s breast heaved. There was a straining at the straps which bound him . . . the man was alive! Warden, physicians, everybody lost their wits. There was a startled cry for the current to be switched on again. Signals, only half understood, were given to those in the next room at the switchboard. When they knew what had happened, they were prompt to act, and the switch handle could be heard as it was pulled back and forth, breaking the deadly current into jets.’
Taking no further chances, a second charge of 1,030 volts was allowed to flow through Kemmler’s body for four minutes. Smoke was seen rising from the head electrode, and it was not until the body went limp that the current was switched off and Kemmler’s lifeless body was removed from the chair.
Those on duty during an execution were always prepared to allow the victim to say a few final words, and doubtless expected a fervent prayer or protestation of innocence when murderer Charles Fithian, on taking his place in the electric chair, said he had a complaint to make. Granted permission, he then exclaimed, ‘That soup I had for supper tonight was too hot!’
John Louis Evans
In April 1983 no fewer than three surges of current were needed to dispatch John Evans. During the first attempt, a defect was found with the wiring on the leg electrode: the wiring had burned right through, shorting the circuit. So, while Evans continued to sit in the chair, the technician hastily replaced the defective wiring, and once again the switch was thrown, but this time smoke was seen coming from the victim’s mouth and left leg! Rather than delay any longer, two further applications of current were applied, Evans’ body eventually sagging against its restraining straps, but ten minutes elapsed before he was confirmed dead by the prison doctor.
Not all criminals were overcome by the solemnity of the execution chamber. The Chicago gangster George Appel, on being strapped into the electric chair, exclaimed to the watching reporters, ‘Well, folks, you’ll soon see a baked Appel!’
Albert Fish
In 1928 Mr Budd of New York was contacted by a man offering to give his son a job. At the Budd’s house the man, Albert Fish, also met his host’s 10-year-old daughter Grace, and he offered to take the little girl to a birthday party being given by his sister. Somewhat reluctantly Mr Budd and his wife agreed. Grace never returned, vanishing without trace. Their overwhelming sense of loss continued for six years and was made even worse when they received an unsigned letter – later traced to Fish – which said, ‘I came to your flat on 3 June 1928 and under the pretext of taking your daughter Grace to a birthday party at my sister’s, I took her to an empty house in Westchester County and I choked her to death. I cut her up and ate a part of her flesh.’
Not long after writing this letter he was tracked down and arrested, much to the surprise of his unsuspecting neighbours to whom he had always seemed to be a quiet unassuming family man with six children, rather than the sado-masochistic pervert portrayed by some of the more sensational New York newspapers.
After further investigation and interrogation he was charged with the little girl’s murder and he finally admitted his guilt, subsequently signing no fewer than six confessions in which he described in lurid detail what he had done; how he had first decapitated her, then cooked and cannibalised parts of her body. Police records showed that in addition to serving prison sentences for a number of different offences, he was also suspected of killing at least a dozen
‘Suddenly the man’s breast heaved. There was a straining at the straps which bound him . . . the man was alive! Warden, physicians, everybody lost their wits. There was a startled cry for the current to be switched on again. Signals, only half understood, were given to those in the next room at the switchboard. When they knew what had happened, they were prompt to act, and the switch handle could be heard as it was pulled back and forth, breaking the deadly current into jets.’
Taking no further chances, a second charge of 1,030 volts was allowed to flow through Kemmler’s body for four minutes. Smoke was seen rising from the head electrode, and it was not until the body went limp that the current was switched off and Kemmler’s lifeless body was removed from the chair.
Those on duty during an execution were always prepared to allow the victim to say a few final words, and doubtless expected a fervent prayer or protestation of innocence when murderer Charles Fithian, on taking his place in the electric chair, said he had a complaint to make. Granted permission, he then exclaimed, ‘That soup I had for supper tonight was too hot!’
John Louis Evans
In April 1983 no fewer than three surges of current were needed to dispatch John Evans. During the first attempt, a defect was found with the wiring on the leg electrode: the wiring had burned right through, shorting the circuit. So, while Evans continued to sit in the chair, the technician hastily replaced the defective wiring, and once again the switch was thrown, but this time smoke was seen coming from the victim’s mouth and left leg! Rather than delay any longer, two further applications of current were applied, Evans’ body eventually sagging against its restraining straps, but ten minutes elapsed before he was confirmed dead by the prison doctor.
Not all criminals were overcome by the solemnity of the execution chamber. The Chicago gangster George Appel, on being strapped into the electric chair, exclaimed to the watching reporters, ‘Well, folks, you’ll soon see a baked Appel!’
Albert Fish
In 1928 Mr Budd of New York was contacted by a man offering to give his son a job. At the Budd’s house the man, Albert Fish, also met his host’s 10-year-old daughter Grace, and he offered to take the little girl to a birthday party being given by his sister. Somewhat reluctantly Mr Budd and his wife agreed. Grace never returned, vanishing without trace. Their overwhelming sense of loss continued for six years and was made even worse when they received an unsigned letter – later traced to Fish – which said, ‘I came to your flat on 3 June 1928 and under the pretext of taking your daughter Grace to a birthday party at my sister’s, I took her to an empty house in Westchester County and I choked her to death. I cut her up and ate a part of her flesh.’
Not long after writing this letter he was tracked down and arrested, much to the surprise of his unsuspecting neighbours to whom he had always seemed to be a quiet unassuming family man with six children, rather than the sado-masochistic pervert portrayed by some of the more sensational New York newspapers.
After further investigation and interrogation he was charged with the little girl’s murder and he finally admitted his guilt, subsequently signing no fewer than six confessions in which he described in lurid detail what he had done; how he had first decapitated her, then cooked and cannibalised parts of her body. Police records showed that in addition to serving prison sentences for a number of different offences, he was also suspected of killing at least a dozen
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