← It Could Happen Here
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This is an iHeart podcast.
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The murder of an 18 year old girl in Graves County, Kentucky went unsolved for years until a local housewife, a journalist and a handful of girls came forward with a story.
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America, y' all better wake the hell up. Bad things happens to good people in small towns.
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Listen to Graves county on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts and to binge the entire season ad free. Subscribe to Lava for Good plus on Apple Podcasts.
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I knew it was a bomb the second that it exploded. I felt it rip through me. In season two of Rip Current, we ask who tried to kill Judy Berry and why.
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They were climbing trees and they were sabotaging logging equip in the woods.
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She received death threats before the bombing. She received more threats after the bombing.
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I think that this is a deliberate.
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Attempt to sabotage our movement. Episodes of Rip Current Season 2 are available now. Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Decoding Women's Health. I'm Dr. Elizabeth Poynter, Chair of Women's Health and Gynecology at the Atria Health Institute in New York City. I'll be talking to top researchers and clinicians and bringing vital information about midlife women's health directly to you. 100% of women go through menopause.
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Even if it's natural, why should we suffer through it?
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Listen to Decoding Women's Health with Dr. Elizabeth Poynter on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Jenna World Jenna Jamison Vivid Video and the Valley is a new podcast about the history of the adult film industry. Hi, I'm Molly Lambert and I'll be your tour guide on a wild trip through adult films. We get paid more than the men. We call the shots.
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In what way is that degrading? That's us taking hold of our life.
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Listen to Gentle world on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. Coal Zone Media A Warning this episode includes violent content which some listeners might find disturbing.
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I'm Michael Phillips, an historian and the author of a history of racism in Dallas called White Metropolis and the co author with longtime journalist Betsy Freehoff, of a history of eugenics in Texas called the Purifying Knife.
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And I'm Steven Monticelli. I'm an investigative reporter who specializes in political extremism and far right Internet culture, and I contribute to outlets like the Texas observer, the Barbed Wire, and more.
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In the last episode, we began exploring the shady history behind the most popular form of capital punishment in the United States, lethal injection. We described how, one after another, execution by hanging, then the electric chair, and then the gas chamber was touted as cleanest, quickest, most modern and painless way to put a person to death. Each method, however, proved more violent and gruesome than previously expected. In order to prevent a groundswell of opposition to the death penalty, politicians responded by abolishing public executions. And the 1970s latched on to lethal injection as the newest, gentlest and kindest method of state killing.
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As discussed in the first episode, the lethal injection protocol was designed by an Oklahoma coroner, Dr. Stephen Crawford, who once admitted to an interviewer that although he was an expert in dead bodies, he didn't know how to get them that way. Authorities turned to Crawford because doctors who dealt with living bodies wanted nothing to do with executions. So Crawford designed a three drug protocol for executions that he made up pretty much out of thin air, reasoning that if one deadly drug was good for killing, then three drugs would be even better. The problem was that the three drugs counteract each other and would result in longer executions and in deaths that resembled slow drowning.
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Crawford did no homework, and neither did the more than 30 states that eventually adopted lethal injection as the preferred method of execution. This occurred after the Supreme Court brought the death penalty back to life with its 1976 Gregg v. Georgia decision. Following a ten year pause, it would not be until December 7, 1982, the state of Texas carried out the first execution by lethal injection in the world. In this episode, we'll talk to a journalist, Dick Revis, who witnessed Brooks execution.
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One thing I noticed was that there were a half dozen or more lawmen in there who had on cowboy hats. They did not remove them when Charlie was killed. And I also thought that wasn't quite right. But in any case, I don't recall any anybody saying anything. We were silent while all of this was going on, and Charlie only spoke to say Allahu Akbar. And he was dying when that happened. It was obvious that he was scared to death.
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Revis told us that Brooks, as he recalled it, seemingly drifted off to sleep. But that's not all that may have been occurring. According to Professor Corinna Lane, the author of the recently published book Secrets of the Killing State, who you heard from in the first episode, something very different was likely going on in Brooks mind and body. According to Lane, Brooks was slowly suffocating. Medical experts, Lane said, believe that those executed with lethal injections are often not fully unconscious and that the paralytic drugs fed into their veins prevent them from fully communicating their suffering, even as they may be aware of it.
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The courts that have heard this medical testimony, there was a court in Ohio and said, yeah, you know, all of the medical experts are describing acute pulmonary edema as a drowning from within. It is, you can't catch your breath, you've got fluid coming into your lungs and you can't do anything about it. And the court said, you know, this is the sensation akin to waterboarding. You know, we're waterboarding people to death. That's what we're actually doing.
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In this episode, we'll also talk about how the modern death penalty peaked in the 1990s and why pressure from drug manufacturers and activists led not only to a decline in executions, but the revival in some states of some very old forms of execution, such as the electric chair and the firing squad.
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It's a fascinating but often frightening story, and one that will have to continue after perhaps less gripping messages from our sponsors.
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There's nothing like sinking into luxury. Annabe sofas combine ultimate comfort and design at an affordable price. Annabe has designed the only fully machine washable sofa for from top to bottom, the stain resistant performance fabric slipcovers and cloud like frame duvet can go straight into your wash. Perfect for anyone with kids, pets or anyone who loves an easy to clean spotless sofa. With a modular design and changeable slipcovers, you can customize your sofa to fit any space and style. Whether you need a single chair, loveseat or a luxuriously large sectional, Annabe has you covered. Visit washablesofas.com to upgrade your home. Sofas start at just $699 and right now get early access to Black Friday savings up to 60% off storewide with a 30 day money back guarantee. Shop now@washablesofas.com Add a little to your life. Offers are subject to change and certain restrictions may apply.
- [08:07]
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I'm Robert Smith and this is Jacob.
- [08:09]
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Goldstein and we used to host a show called Planet Money.
- [08:12]
A
And now we're back making this new podcast called Business History about the best ideas and people and businesses in history.
- [08:21]
E
And some of the worst people, horrible ideas and destructive companies in the history of business. Having a genius idea without a need for it is nothing. It's like not having it at all.
- [08:32]
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It's a very simple, elegant lesson.
- [08:35]
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Make something people want.
- [08:38]
A
First Episode How Southwest Airlines use cheap seats and free whiskey to fight its.
- [08:42]
E
Way into the airline business. The most Texas story ever. There's a lot of mavericks in that story. We're gonna have mavericks on the show. We're gonna have plenty of robber barons.
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So many robber barons. And you know what?
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They're not all bad.
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And we'll talk about some of the classic great moments of famous business geniuses, along with some of the darker moments that often get overlooked, like Thomas Edison and the electric chair. Listen to business history on the iHeartRadio.
- [09:05]
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App, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [09:14]
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All I know is what I've been.
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Told, and that's a half truth is a whole lie.
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For almost a decade, the murder of an 18 year old girl from a small town in Graves County, Kentucky went unsolved until a local homemaker, a journalist and a handful of girls came forward with a story.
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I'm telling you, we know Quincy.
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A story that law enforcement used to convict six people and that got the citizen investigator on national tv.
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Through sheer persistence and nerve, this Kentucky housewife helped give justice to Jessica Curran.
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My name is Maggie Freeling. I'm a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist producer and I wouldn't be here if the truth were that easy to find.
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I did not know her and I.
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Did not kill her or rape or.
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Burn or any of that other stuff that y' all said.
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They literally made me say that I.
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Took a match and struck and threw it on her.
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They made me say that I poured.
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Gas on her.
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From Lava for good. This is Graves County, a show about just how far our legal system will go in order to find someone to blame.
- [10:27]
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America, y' all better wake the hell up.
- [10:29]
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Bad things happens to good people and small towns.
- [10:36]
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Listen to Graves county in the Bone Valley, feed on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. And to binge the entire season ad free, subscribe to Lava for Good plus on Apple Podcasts.
- [10:58]
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You know the shade is always shadiest right here. Season six of the podcast Reasonably Shady with Gisele Bryant and Robin Dixon is here dropping every Monday. As two of the founding members of the Real Housewives Potomac. We're giving you all the laughs, drama and reality news you can handle. And you know we don't hold back, so come be reasonable or shady with us each and every Monday, I was going through a walk in my neighborhood. Out of the blue, I see this huge sign next to somebody's house. The sign says, my neighbor is a Karen. No way I died laughing. I'm like, I have to know you are lying. Humongous, y'. All. They had some time on their hands. Listen to Reasonably Shady from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
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Big changes came to the death penalty in Texas in 1923. Before then, hangings were carried out by sheriffs in the counties where the murders, rapes and other crimes committed by the prisoner took place. Many of the sheriffs were inexperienced at hanging and goring mishaps took place. Texas last public execution unfolded on August 31, 1923, when African American Nathan Lee was hanged before 150 spectators in Brazoria County. From 1900 to 1920, close to 70% of the inmates executed in Texas were African American.
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In 1923, Texas sought to modernize and bring industrial efficiency to state killing. All executions henceforth would be carried out at the state prison in Huntsville, and prisoners would die in in an electric chair. Locals gave it a glib name, Old Sparky. The state's new killing machine got a workout the day it debuted, February 8, 1925. Texas executed five prisoners that day, all black men. Between that date and July 30, 1964, when the state electrocuted Joseph Johnson, a man convicted of fatally shooting a store owner during a robbery, Texas sent 361 inmates to the electric chair. African Americans made up 63% of the prisoners who died in that chair, while 7% of those who died in the electric chair were Mexican American. Texas politicians insisted that their tough on crime policies served as a deterrent. But in fact, from 1933 to 1964, the year Joseph Johnson was executed, the murder rate in Texas was 12.7 per 100,000 people, the eighth highest in the United States. Nevertheless, Texas leaders have continued to justify the death penalty in spite of its seemingly negligible impact on the state's violent culture. And the violence of capital punishment was about performative toughness, not about stopping future murders, as a reporter who witnessed a hanging laments in the film In Cold Blood. And then next month, next year, same thing will happen again.
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Maybe this will help to stop it. Never have.
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After Johnson, Texas didn't execute another inmate for 18 years. Following the Greg vs. Georgia decision, Texas faced a potential public relations disaster. As we mentioned last episode, Dallas television reporter Tony Garrett filed suit to allow television cameras to film executions, and a federal district court granted a preliminary injunction in the reporter's favor. That injunction was later overturned. But under the Texas Capitol dome, there was worry about what would happen to support for the death penalty if an electrocution was broadcast live. The legislator who Wrote Texas new death penalty law. The Greg decision said he was, quote, repulsed by the idea of an electrocution taking place in someone's living room. Lethal injection, as Professor Lane had put it, had visual appeal because it would resemble helpful medical procedures and because, quote, states have been euthanizing pets with pentobarbital since the 1930s.
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Animals are typically put to sleep with a two drug protocol. First a sedative and then the drug that does the deed. But the three drug protocol that would be adopted by most states that allowed capital punishment produced nightmarish results that were typically invisible to witnesses. States typically allowed family members of the crime victim to attend executions, and the condemned also got to choose witnesses. In the early days of Texas's reborn death penalty, the state's populist Democratic attorney general, Jim Maddox, liked to make a show of attending each execution. And though much of the death penalty process has been shrouded in secrecy, such as who is providing the lethal chemicals, states also allowed reporters to attend executions so that they could serve as the eyes and ears of the public.
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In his younger days, Dick Revis was a civil rights activist who served time in an Alabama jail for his efforts to secure voting rights for African Americans. Revis became a journalist, and by the early 1980s, he was a frequent contributor to Texas Monthly, one of the state's premier Investigative Publications. In 1982, he got the chance to witness an event that had never happened. And in the United States, or perhaps even the world, the Texas department of corrections would soon pioneer the use of lethal injection. Although the first person to be put to death in this manner was still unclear.
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I recall a meeting with an editor and they said, somehow they told me that there's a lady at the capitol or a lady in the government in Austin, which is where I was living then, who was in charge of scheduling the executions. So I called her up and she said, well, she didn't have any of them scheduled, but she could give me the names of. It was either four or five people who would be first. And one of them was Candyman, the fellow who poisoned his own child. Putting poison in a and some candy at Halloween.
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Revis is referring to Ronald Clark o', Brien, a Houston area optician who fell into debt. He was $100,000 deep, so he bought a life insurance policy on his eight year old son and daughter before he prepared five pixie sticks poisoned with potassium cyanide. And on Halloween night in 1974, he went trick or treating with his children. A neighbor and that man's two children the group went to an abandoned house and knocked on the door, and when no one answered, o' Brien convinced the rest of the group to move on. He caught up with them later and claimed that someone had in fact answered the door, and then he handed out four of the poisoned candies to the children. When the o' Briens returned home, the killer handed the fifth pixy stick to a neighborhood child. Later that night, o' Brien told his children that they could enjoy one candy from the evening, and he urged them to choose the Pixy Stix. And when his child Timothy, complained the candy tasted bitter, o' Brien gave him Kool Aid to wash down the poison. Timothy started vomiting and died on the way to the hospital.
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None of the other children tried the poisoned candy that night. O' Brien claimed that a malevolent stranger had poisoned the candy, and he sang at his son's funeral. His story fell apart, however, when the police discovered the life insurance policies. When o' Brien was unable to identify the house where he had been supposedly handed the pixie sticks, and when the cops found out that o' Brien had purchased cyanide from a chemical store in Houston, a jury sentenced him to death on June 3, 1975. The murder created a lasting national legacy, sparking paranoia about the safety of trick or treating.
- [18:58]
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State of Texas knew that executing o' Brien would be politically popular and would probably boost support for the death penalty. Not knowing which resident of Texas death row would be strapped to the gurney first, Revis ended up interviewing all but one inmate on the list he had been given. The appeals process, however, is unpredictable and a Fort Worth man known for most of his life as Charlie Brooks would end up winning the dubious honor of being the first to be put to death by lethal injection. He was convicted for the fatal shooting of a 26 year old mechanic, David Gregory, during a 1976 robbery.
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By the time Revis interviewed him, Brooks had converted to Islam and taken the name Sharif Ahmad Abdul Rahim. That is the name we will use referring to him for the rest of the episode. Abdul Rahim had committed the robbery with another man, Woody Lourdes. He posed to someone wanting to buy a used car and asked to take a test drive. Gregory agreed to ride with him. Abdul Rahim picked up Lourdes. The pair threw Gregory in a car trunk, drove him to a ramshackle motel, tied him to a chair and taped his mouth shut. Abdul Rahim and Lourdes accused each other of firing the fatal shot. No weapon was ever found. Lourdes eventually received the death penalty, but after that was overturned he reached an agreement with prosecutors and received a 40 year sentence. He would end up serving only 11. The disparity in sentencing is one of the defining features of how capital punishment is carried out. Even after Greg versus Georgia had supposedly.
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A
Addressed that issue shortly before his execution, Abdul Rahim insisted on his innocence. But according to Revis, the condemned man was lying. Revis described to us his relationship with Abdul Rahim, AKA Charlie Brooks.
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C
Charlie was very alert, fast on his feet, engaged. He was not moping around, sad. He had a sense of humor. He told me in the first interview I had with him that he was innocent and that this was racial discrimination, that they executed more blacks than whites. And I told him, oh, what you want is for them to execute more white people, huh? And that stunned him because I think no one had ever said that to him. But that would do away with racial discrimination. And there's lots of white people need executing too, was my way of thinking. And he didn't get mad at me or anything. He kind of laughed at it himself. After he paused to understand the question, then he kind of laughed at it himself. But I would say he was even until, until they got him strapped down, he was in control of his own body. His mind was in great shape. He lied to me about, about whether or not he was innocent.
- [22:05]
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Brooks told Revis that although the gun went off, he didn't pull the trigger. It was an accident.
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C
At some point I got him to say that, oh, the gun went off and I went and pulled the transcript of his criminal trial. The gun was a revolver, not an automatic. Revolvers don't go off. To test that theory, I even took one I had and banged it on a table while it was loaded and all and nothing happened. Revolvers don't go off until they've been cocked. Unless they've been cocked, they can't go off.
- [22:47]
A
We'll return to the story of the world's first execution by lethal injection and the deceptive way it was used to win public support for capital punishment. After this lovely ad break.
- [23:02]
B
There's nothing like sinking into luxury. Anna Bay sofas combine ultimate comfort and design at an affordable price. Affordable price. Annabe has designed the only fully machine washable sofa. From top to bottom, the stain resistant performance fabric slipcovers and cloud like frame duvet can go straight into your wash. Perfect for anyone with kids, pets or anyone who loves an easy to clean spotless sofa. With a modular design and changeable slipcovers, you can customize your sofa to fit any space and style. Whether you need a single chair, loveseat or a luxuriously large sectional. Annabe has you covered. Visit washablesofas.com to upgrade your home. Sofas start at just $699 and right now get early access to Black Friday savings up to 60% off storewide with a 30 day money back guarantee. Shop now@washablesofas.com Add a little to your life. Offers are subject to check change and certain restrictions may apply.
- [24:02]
A
I'm Robert Smith and this is Jacob Goldstein.
- [24:04]
E
And we used to host a show called Planet Money.
- [24:06]
A
And now we're back making this new podcast called Business History about the best ideas and people and businesses in history.
- [24:15]
E
And some of the worst people, horrible ideas and destructive companies in the history of business. Having a genius idea without a need for it is nothing. It's like not having it at all.
- [24:27]
A
It's a very simple, elegant lesson.
- [24:30]
E
Make something people want.
- [24:32]
A
First episode, how Southwest Airlines used cheap seats and free whiskey to fight its.
- [24:37]
E
Way into the airline business. The most Texas story ever. There's a lot of mavericks in that story. We're going to have mavericks on the show.
- [24:43]
A
We're going to have plenty of robber barons. So many robber barons. And you know what?
- [24:46]
E
They're not all bad.
- [24:47]
A
And we'll talk about some of the classic great moments of famous business geniuses, along with some of the darker moments that often get overlooked, like Thomas Edison and the electric chair. Listen to business history on the iHeartRadio.
- [24:59]
E
App, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [25:08]
A
All I know is what I've been told.
- [25:11]
E
And that's a half truth is a whole lie.
- [25:14]
B
For almost a decade, the murder of an 18 year old girl from a small town in Graves County, Kentucky went unsolved until a local homemaker, a journalist and a handful of girls came forward with a story.
- [25:29]
E
I'm telling you, we know Quincy killed her.
- [25:32]
B
We know a story that law enforcement used to convict six people and that got the citizen investigator on national tv.
- [25:41]
E
Through sheer persistence and nerve, this Kentucky housewife helped give justice to Jessica Curran.
- [25:48]
B
My name is Maggie Freeling. I'm a Pulitzer Prize winning journalist producer and I wouldn't be here if the truth were that easy to find.
- [25:58]
A
I did not know her and I.
- [25:59]
C
Did not kill her or rape or.
- [26:01]
A
Burn or any of that other stuff that y' all said. They literally made me say that I.
- [26:05]
D
Took a match and struck and threw it on her.
- [26:07]
A
They made me say that I poured.
- [26:08]
C
Gas on her.
- [26:11]
B
From lava for good. This is Graves County, a show about just how far our legal system will go in order to find someone to blame.
- [26:22]
A
America, y' all better wake the hell up.
- [26:24]
C
Bad things happens to good people in small towns.
- [26:31]
B
Listen to Graves county in the Bone Valley feed on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts and to binge the entire season ad free. Subscribe to Lava for Good plus on Apple Podcasts.
- [26:52]
A
Michael Lewis here My book the Big Short tells the story of the buildup and birth of the US housing market back in 2008. It follows a few unlikely but lucky people who saw the real estate market for the black hole it would become and eventually made billions of dollars from that perception. It was like feeding the monster, said Eisman. We fed the monster until it blew up. The monster was exploding, yet on the streets of Manhattan, there was no sign anything important had just happened. Now, 15 years after the Big Short's original release and a decade after it became an Academy Award winning movie, I've recorded an audiobook edition for the very first time. The Big Short story. What it means when people start betting against the market and who really pays for an unchecked financial system is as relevant today as it's ever been, offering invaluable insight into the current economy and also today's politics. Get the Big Short now at Pushkin FM Audiobooks or wherever audiobooks are sold.
- [28:02]
E
There was a little bit of last minute drama as zero Hour for the execution of Charlie Brooks, AKA Abdul Rahim, approached, the Supreme Court rejected his appeal for the last time. Shortly before the execution was scheduled to begin, Jack Strickland, the prosecutor in Abdul Rahim's murder trial, had second thoughts about the differences between the condemned man's sentence and that of his accomplice. Strickland testified on Abdul Rahim's behalf, but to no avail. The fifth Circuit Court of Appeals said the defense team had presented no new information that would justify a stay of execution. Just after midnight, state Attorney General Mark White called officials in Huntsville and told them that the historic execution could begin.
- [28:48]
A
From 1982, the year of Abdul Rahim's execution, until 2011, Texas allowed prisoners facing executions a choice of a last meal of their choosing. Abdul Rahim's request, however, was rejected.
- [29:01]
C
He told me that for his last meal he wanted fried shrimp and oysters, and he said he had told the authorities that that's what he wanted for his last meal. When I got down there, I was told that there was no shellfish in the prison system's kitchens and Charlie had to pick. He finally picked steak and each Cobbler. But I felt bad about that because the prison people knew that they could go to the grocery store and buy whatever Charlie wanted and they didn't do it. And it was sort of. I thought it was an indignity they inflicted on him. So when I went down for the execution, I went down in the afternoon. Execution was that night. I went out and ate fish.
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Just to.
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How do you say? I don't know. Because of the situation.
- [30:10]
A
Texas would end this final meal for prisoners on death row in 2011. That's because of Lawrence Russell Brewer, who was one of three white supremacists who chained an African American man, James Byrd, to the back of a car in Jasper, Texas and dragged him to death on June 7, 1998. As a last act of bitter defiance. On the date of Brewer's execution, September 21, 2011, Brewer ordered a last meal that included two chicken fried steaks, a triple meat bacon cheeseburger, fried okra, a pound of barbecue, three fajitas, a meat lover's pizza, a pint of ice cream and a slab of peanut butter fudge with crust peanuts. When he received all the food, he refused to touch a bite. State Senator John Whitmire complained bitterly at the waist, an expense lavished on such an infamous killer. And prison officials immediately changed the policy. Today, those facing execution are now only fed the same meal other prisoners receive that day.
- [31:11]
E
Revis believes that the process of being strapped down to a hospital like gurney is humiliating to those being executed.
- [31:18]
C
Men die with more dignity when they're on their feet, for example, as walking to a scaffold when they still feel in control of their lives. The hardest thing about lethal injections is that they strap you down where you can't move and you're sitting there absolutely helpless until they. Until the drugs take effect.
- [31:49]
E
Revis described the atmosphere in the death chamber as Abdul Rahim was executed as tense and quiet. A prison girlfriend as Revis describes her, Vanessa Sapp was present, as were numerous officials.
- [32:03]
C
First of all, the room is too small. My recollection is there was a circular set of chairs threading out 10ft, 20ft in a curve. It might have been a corner, but it was barely room to hold the lawmen who wanted to witness the execution and Vanessa Sapp and three reporters. His wife was not present. She didn't want to be and she didn't want the kids to see it. As for the audience reaction, I don't recall that there was anything dramatic. No, it seemed more routine.
- [32:49]
A
Inspired by the story of Carol Chessman, the Author and rapist executed in the gas Chamber in 1960, who worked out a signal he could send to reporters if he was suffering during the execution. Revis and Abdul Rahim worked out a similar arrangement. If Abdul Rahim was suffering as he was dying, he would shake his head. Revis would later regret making that arrangement.
- [33:12]
C
I interviewed him before the execution and we came up with an idea. Unfortunately it was mine, that if he felt pain while he was dying, that he should shake his head side to side. And I say it's unfortunate because, and as things were, we were unable to. I was unable to determine if he was giving me that signal.
- [33:46]
E
To Revis, it appeared that Abdul Rahim had simply drifted off to sleep.
- [33:51]
C
He seemed to die peacefully. I had to put down a dog a couple of years ago or have the dog put down. And I was with him while that happened and I couldn't. How do you say, after seeing those two things? I said I wish I could die that way. And there was no evidence with my dog, for example, that there was any pain. It was like I put him to sleep. And I think that's what they did with Charlie. But it would take a doctor to know.
- [34:31]
E
Of course, Abdul Rahim's death was the first of its kind. As we mentioned last time, the three drug protocol that was used by most states over the last three decades was concocted out of thin air by someone no expertise on the effect of these drugs together on the human body. Abdul Rahim's execution was a medical experiment conducted with no prior research. Professor Lane said that since Abdul Rahim's execution, doctors have had a chance to perform autopsies on those executed by lethal injection. And witnesses have heard the cries of those who were able to speak while dying on the gurney.
- [35:07]
D
You know, the state experts are saying, oh, this first drug you're going to be 99.999% of the public would be, you know, out and dead within a minute. You don't even have to worry about those other super torturous drugs. And it's like, yeah, that's not what was happening. They said they would stop breathing within a minute. And there was some pretty prominent litigation, the Morales case out in California where they looked at the executions by lethal injection and said over half of them they actually did not stop breathing within a minute. In fact, it was eight and nine minutes and it did not kill them within two minutes of injecting that third drug, which is called potassium chloride, but it's referred to as liquid fire. And it chemically burns the Veins as it races to the heart where it induces a cardiac arrest. So they're like, you know, the experts like, oh, you know that it's going to bring death in two minutes.
- [36:10]
B
That didn't happen.
- [36:11]
D
Like none of this was happening as the state and the state's experts were so confidently just saying. And it turns out, you know, no one had ever studied these drugs in these amounts. Nobody had ever injected these drugs in these amounts into people. This is not what was used. I mean, that's interesting too. Like, this is not the drug that was used to euthanize pets. This is not the drug that was used for physician assisted suicide. So it's like three totally different drugs. And you know, and not, not only is nobody studied or nobody knew how they would work, but nobody could have predicted how they would have worked together.
- [36:59]
A
As discussed in our last episode, the lethal injection that killed Abdul Rahim included three sodium theopental, a heavy sedative, pancheronium bromide, meant to suffocate the prisoner, and potassium chloride, meant to trigger a cardiac arrest. As professor Lane wrote in her book secrets of the killing State, because of one of the drugs used in three drug protocol, the drugs work poorly when combined. Quote, the panchorium bromide couples the inability to breathe with the inability to struggle. They cannot fight or scream or even writhe in pain.
- [37:33]
E
But all would seem calm on the surface. Texas experiment in lethal injection was a political success. And for a while, the novelty of the revived death penalty brought back memories of some public hangings. Students from nearby Sam Houston State University would show up and hold drunken parties outside the prison in Huntsville on the night of executions, cheering loudly enough that they could be heard inside the death chamber. The night that Ronald Clark o', Brien, the infamous Candyman who killed his son for insurance money, died, a crowd of about 300 celebrated outside, some yelling trick or treat at the scheduled time of the execution and pelting anti death penalty protesters with candy. A huge cheer erupted when the officials of the walls unit left, signaling that o' Brien had died. A local bar threw a Halloween party.
- [38:26]
A
Texas politicians made support for the death penalty central to their campaigns in this era. In the 1990 Democratic Party gubernatorial primary, former Texas Governor Mark White faced off against the state attorney general, Jim Maddox, and the eventual winner, state treasurer Ann Richards. White and Maddox ran almost identical campaign ads, both walking past larger than life mugshots of murderers who were executed under their watch and claiming credit for meting out justice. Consider this ad for White. These hardened criminals will never again murder, rape or deal Draw. As governor, I made sure they received the ultimate punishment. Death. And Texas is a safer place for it. But tough talk isn't enough. The criminals know how to tangle up the courts and delay executions. To bring them to justice takes strength and dedication. Because if the governor flinches, they win. Only a governor can make executions happen. I did, and I will. The popularity of the death penalty was sealed. For decades, starting with Abdul Rahim, Texas has led the United States in state killing. As of September 27, Texas had carried out 596 executions, more than 36% of all of the executions that have unfolded since the United States Supreme Court allowed the death penalty to resume in this country in 1976.
- [39:49]
E
More than 40% of those executed in Texas since 1982 had been African American. Almost 30% had been Mexican American. In 2024, Texas executed six people. Only one was white.
- [40:02]
A
Meanwhile, Texas put to death 63 prisoners who committed their crimes before they reached the age of 21, according to the Texas Coalition against the death penalty. Since 1973, 18 people sent to Texas death row were later exonerated, out of about 200 nationally. And the group argues that there is strong evidence that at least six put to death in Huntsville were actually innocent.
- [40:25]
E
Professor Lane argues that not only does death by lethal injection violate the Eighth amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, but that most defendants facing the death penalty cannot afford adequate legal counsel, and that an alarming number of those sent to death row and, in some cases executed have been innocent.
- [40:45]
D
200 people have been exonerated from death row. 200. And when you put that next to the 1600 executions that we've had in the modern era, what we really have is for every eight executions, there's one exoneration that is a terrible, terrible number, right? For every eight times we kill someone, we almost killed the wrong person. And then there was this National Academy of Sciences report that came out. This is the Gross Report, Samuel Gross. And they said, here's a conservative estimate. 4.1% of all people on death row today are factually innocent. 4.1%. That's 1 in 25.
- [41:32]
E
According to the Texas Coalition against the Death penalty, as of 2014, the total legal cost of executing a prisoner was nearly $4 million, as opposed to the 1.3 million spent to keep someone in prison for life. Lane argues that morality aside, capital punishment is catastrophically expensive. Imposing sentences of life without parole, or what criminal justice experts call lwop, would not only eliminate the risk of making an irreversible mistake by putting an innocent person to death, but also save taxpayers money.
- [42:07]
D
As an example, here's Florida. $51 million. 51 million. That is what Florida spends every year to maintain the death penalty over and above what it would cost to punish all first degree murderers with lwop. And if you look at the costs that Florida spent and then look at the executions that they had, how much did it cost per execution, you know, to maintain the system and then of course the product of it, executions, what you're getting out of it, per execution, 24 million. $24 million per execution. You know, and I'm a former prosecutor and I just have to say, what could you do with $24 million? You know, I'd take, I take 8 million and I'd put it into victim services. Now we're getting into the death penalty more broadly. But one of the things I found as I'm on this book tour and on the road, I'm talking to survivors, their family members have been slain. And one, a woman in Tennessee is particularly. She's coming to mind right now. And she said, listen, when my son was murdered, I couldn't get out of bed in the morning. I was afraid I was going to lose my job. I was afraid I was going to lose my house. I needed therapy, I needed services, I needed child care to help. I couldn't do that. My kids needed therapy. We had all of these needs. And the state of Tennessee said, you know, Department of Mental health said, we don't have that money, sorry, you know, and so she said, we're spending it all. In fact, what she said is it's selfish. You're spending millions upon millions upon millions on death sentences and, you know, on the death penalty when it could actually go to the people who need it.
- [44:06]
A
Regardless of the financial costs, death by lethal injection has become so commonplace that executions rarely catch public attention. Nationally, 1,377 people have been put to death by some form of lethal injection since 1982. Those executed suffered not only because of the chemicals used, but because, as was predicted in 1890, medical professionals have refused to participate because of ethical rules prohibiting the harm of patients. Doctors and nurses and paramedics generally refused to administer the lethal cocktails used in death chambers. That task generally falls to seriously undertrained prison personnel who are asked to secure an IV line for condemned prisoners who often because of age, history of drug abuse or other health problems, have veins that are difficult to access. Heavily muscled prisoners, those who are morbidly obese and those with dark skin can also present challenges for the amateur phlebotomist trying to set up an execution.
- [45:03]
E
Prisons sometimes lack the right equipment, such as the correct size syringes or proper tubing. Lethal injection drugs are pre made and have to be mixed by personnel not properly trained in chemistry, which results in errors in dosing. Often people with any kind of medical competence who participate in executions are the ones with the shadiest ethical records. Professor Lane came across one case in which the state of Missouri relied on a doctor who ignored ethical guidelines and participated in the capital punishment process. He was incorrectly mixing the chemicals so that the prisoners were only receiving half the dose of the anesthesia meant to reduce the pain of condemned as required by law. Dr. Lane shared the horrifying discoveries lawyers who condemned prisoners made about that particular doctor.
- [45:51]
D
They looked, you know, at the protocol that was litigated and authorized by a federal court, and it was 5 grams of this particular drug. And they looked at the execution logs of the last several and states were using 2.5. And so, you know, they filed suit. That's half the anesthetic, you know, and the state, you know, wrote back and said, we are not using half the anesthetic. It must be the pharmacy logs that are wrong. We're going to track that down and figure out why they're wrong. But we rest assure you, we are not violating the protocol. We're doing the amount that was legally authorized rised. Well, they have to come back the next day and say, oh, actually the logs were right, we were wrong. We were injecting half of the amount. And so the court gives the lawyers for the condemned prisoners a limited deposition to question this doctor behind the veil, like they didn't know who he was, but to question him under oath. And you know, they're like, why are you using half? And he said, well, I'm dyslexic and so sometimes I make mistakes. And yet Missouri stuck with them and said, no, we have every confidence in them. They lose that. The trial court, the federal court says this guy can't be anywhere near. Look, the whole thing, to the extent it's humane, requires you to meticulously measure and mix chemicals in liquids. And so you can't have someone who just makes mistakes. And then in the meantime, investigative journalists, which, you know, I have to take my hat off, I tip my hat to investigative journalists. But they were like, gee, who is this, you know, dyslexic doctor? And they find out his identity, you know, he admits it's him. He had over 20 male practice suits he had had his hospital privileges revoked at two hospitals. He had been censured by the medical board. So, you know, you're asking someone to do something, to participate in something that is fundamentally against your reason for being as a doctor. And, you know, from time to time they find people. But I think they're outliers. What I have found is they are outliers, not only on ethics, but in other ways, too.
- [48:23]
A
Experts on capital punishment like Lane aren't comfortable with describing executions that go off script as botched, even if it's a commonly used term. No matter how the execution proceeds, the end result is the same. The inmate is dead. However, there is no question that killing people by lethal injection is so complicated and requires so much skill on the part of the executioners that the process is typically far more agonizing than death penalty advocates tell the public. According to the anti capital punishment organization the Death Penalty Information center, out of 19 executions in 2022, seven were botched, meaning that the death took far longer than expected. That prison personnel had to jab the condemned people multiple times to get an IV line working, or worse.
- [49:09]
E
When Oklahoma executed Clayton Lockett on April 29, 2014, the state used an untested combination of three drugs. The size of the syringes and the amount of drugs used were wrong. Prison personnel made repeated mistakes as they tried to insert the needle for the iv. Even though the American Medical association prohibits its members from participating in executions. A doctor was on hand for the Lockett fiasco. The physician tried but failed to insert an IV into the jugular vein and Lockett's neck. The doctor then performed a surgical procedure called a cut down and which is a deep surgical incision through the skin, muscle and fat performed to expose a central vein under Lockett's clavicle. Procedure was bloody and also failed, and the execution then tried and failed to access a vein through Lockett's feet. Eventually, they tried to insert an IV through the femoral vein in the upper thigh, a procedure only the most skilled surgeons have mastered. Unfortunately, the available needle was the wrong length for it to work properly.
- [50:13]
A
Lockett reportedly was stoic throughout this repeated assault on his body. After an hour of this torture had passed, the execution team was finally able to inject the deadly drugs. Lockett groaned, convulsed, and at one point was asked, are you unconscious? According to witnesses, Lockett opened his eyes and said, no, I am not. After appearing to fall asleep, he began to moan, arched his back and kicked a foot before he strained against the straps holding him against the gurney and he tried to get up. Lockett mumbled, something is wrong. Oh, man, and this shit is fucking up my mind. The prison warden ordered the blinds closed as the execution team scrambled. Swelling had developed where the IV had been inserted and was blocking the flow of the third and final lethal drug. The doctor was summoned to insert a needle in Lockett's other femoral vein. But Lockett was bleeding heavily and the blood backed up into the IV line.
- [51:07]
E
Oklahoma Governor Mary Fallon had already decided to halt the execution. But by this point, Lockett's heart had irreversibly slowed down. He subsequently died of heart failure. The entire execution, from the first attempt to stick an IV in his veins to his death, lasted one hour and 47 minutes. That was one of the longest executions in American history. The state of Oklahoma later falsely claimed that Lockett had been unconscious the entire time. In 2022, another so called botched lethal injection, that of Joe Nathan James in Alabama, lasted three hours. In Ohio and elsewhere, executions had to be abandoned when the prison staff couldn't get an IV going.
- [51:52]
A
As we mentioned in the first episode, Reverend Jeff Hood is a priest under the old Catholic right who, by the time we interviewed, had accompanied 10 men during their executions. He said that even the most professional execution is brutal, but that some states, because of a regrettable amount of practice, are much better at killing than others. I do think that some states know.
- [52:13]
C
What they're doing more than others, and.
- [52:16]
A
I think that Texas knows what they're doing.
- [52:20]
C
You don't see botched or delayed or mishandled executions in Texas.
- [52:26]
A
They go very quickly. And when you talk to these guys.
- [52:30]
C
That'S what they say they would prefer.
- [52:32]
A
If you're going to be executed, you would want to go as quickly as possible.
- [52:37]
C
Yes, there are some executions that look horrific. There are other executions that don't go according to plan but don't get a lot of attention. But they're all horrible, and I think.
- [52:48]
A
They all have to be talked about as such.
- [52:52]
E
Whether it's because of the awareness of the messy and undeniably painful executions like those of Lockett and James, the more than 200 death row exonerations achieved by groups like the Innocence Project, the growing skepticism of law enforcement amongst young people, or the greater consciousness of how racism warps the entire criminal justice system, there's no question that the death penalty is the least popular it has been in the past hundred years. Nor is there doubt that the rate of executions in the United States has dropped well below its peak during the height of the war on crime under the Clinton administration when in 1999, 315 death sentences were handed down, or in 1996 when 98 prisoners were executed.
- [53:41]
A
In any case, deaths like Locketts are bad for business for the pharmaceutical companies who have produced the drugs used in lethal injections. In the next and final episode of this three part series on the shady business of lethal injection, we'll talk about how some states like Texas have been forced to turn to the black market or the so called gray market to buy lethal drugs as pharmaceutical companies have restricted the purchase of those drugs for that purpose. We also talked to Jeff Hood about how the difficulty in obtaining those drugs has led states like Alabama to to turn to one of the most gruesome forms of execution yet. And we'll also hear the story of Race Bouillon, a victim of a hate crime who fought to prevent the execution of his white supremacist attacker. And finally, we'll explore whether the death penalty might be on its last legs in the United States. I'm Steven Manchelli for It Could Happen Here.
- [54:31]
E
Until next time, I'm Michael Phillips. Thanks for listening.
- [54:37]
A
It Could Happen Here is a production of Cool Zone Media.
- [54:39]
B
For more podcasts from Cool Zone Media, Visit our website coolzonemedia.com or check us.
- [54:45]
D
Out on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts.
- [54:47]
B
Or wherever you listen to podcasts, you.
- [54:50]
D
Can now find sources for It Could Happen Here listed directly in Episode Descriptions.
- [54:54]
A
Thanks for listening.
- [54:55]
D
Are we Exposed?
- [54:56]
B
Security teams ask this every day. Vulnerabilities across network, cloud, AI and OT silos hide the truth and attackers are watching. Tenable unifies your tools, teams and data.
- [55:08]
D
So you can spot and close risks fast.
- [55:10]
B
Tenable's AI powered exposure management gives teams.
- [55:14]
D
One view of risk, helping them focus.
- [55:17]
B
Take action and close critical exposures fast. Visit tenable.com tenable. Your exposure ends here. The murder of an 18 year old girl in Graves County, Kentucky was went unsolved for years until a local housewife, a journalist and a handful of girls came forward with a story.
- [55:41]
C
America, y' all better wake the hell up. Bad things happens to good people in small towns.
- [55:53]
B
Listen to Graves county on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts and to binge the entire season ad free. Subscribe to Lava for Good plus on Apple Podcasts.
- [56:07]
A
Welcome to Decoding Women's Health. I'm Dr. Elizabeth Poynter, Chair of Women's Health and Gynecology at the Atria Health Institute in New York City. I'll be talking to top researchers and clinicians and bringing vital information about midlife women's health directly to you. 100 of women go through menopause.
- [56:26]
D
Even if it's natural, why should we suffer through it?
- [56:29]
A
Listen to Decoding Women's Health with Dr. Elizabeth Poynter on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
- [56:38]
C
Join me, Danny Trejo in Tales from the Shadows, an anthology of modern day horror stories inspired by the legends and lore of Latin America. Listen to Nocturnal Tales from the shadows on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.
- [57:07]
A
This is an iHeart podcast.