A question recently posted to Quora asks, “I would love to know what it’s like to wake up in the morning and know that you are going to work, inject someone and then they will die. I would also be interested in hearing what it was like when the electric chair was how the death penalty was given. Any insights, sources, or personal experience is welcome.” Surbhi Dhawan shares selections of “Chilling Testimony of Death Row Executioners Casts Dark Shadow Over Entire System.” Add your own responses in the comments.
I’ll highlight a few excerpts from there, even though I highly recommend that you read the article. It’s a beautiful, beautiful account of every man’s last moments through the executioner’s eyes, and his afterthoughts about the whole thing.
On the process:
“It’s kind of hard to explain what you actually feel, you know, when you talk to a man and you kind of get to know that person, and then you walk him out of a cell and you take him in there to the chamber and tie him down. And then a few minutes later he’s … He’s gone.”
Chaplain Brazzil said that after the inmate is strapped down, all the officers leave. And then it’s himself and the warden in the chamber, and there will be a medical team come in and they will establish an IV into each arm.
Willett said, “I have been somewhat surprised. It never crossed my mind that some of these people are just like the rest of us and are scared to death of a needle.”
He continued. Usually in about three minutes, they have the inmate hooked up to the lines. And at that time, the inmate’s lying on the gurney and Willett and Chaplain Brazzil are in the execution chamber with him.
The Chaplain said, “I usually put my hand on their leg right below their knee, you know, and I usually give ‘em a squeeze, let ‘em know I’m right there. You can feel the trembling, the fear that’s there, the anxiety that’s there. You can feel the heart surging, you know. You can see it pounding through their shirt.”The warden then stands at the head of the prisoner and the Chaplain stands with his hand on the prisoner’s knee. The warden asks the condemned man if he has any last words he’d like to say. “A boom mike will come down from the ceiling and sometimes you can see the man who’s strapped in with probably eight to 10 straps across his body,” the narrator says. “He’ll struggle to get his voice close to the mike. It’s not necessary, but he does it anyway.”
The wardens said that some inmates decline to speak, some sing, some pray. Some apologize. Some will declare, for one last time, that an innocent man is being killed.
“And then there have been some men who have been executed that I knew, and I’ve had them tell me goodbye,” one warden said.The Chaplain said, “I’ve had several of them where [I’m] watching their last breath go from their bodies and their eyes never unfix from mine. I mean actually lock together. And I can close my eyes now and see those eyes. My feelings and my emotions are extremely intense at that time. I’ve never ... I’ve never really been able to describe it. And I guess in a way I’m kind of afraid to describe it. I’ve never really delved into that part of my feelings yet.”
One warden said, “You’ll never hear another sound like a mother wailing when she is watching her son be executed. There’s no other sound like it. It is just this horrendous wail. It’s definitely something you won’t ever forget.”
