ANGOLA — – With executions officially resuming in Louisiana, the state plans to carry out death sentences for at least three more condemned inmates on death row this year.
Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill, a vocal advocate for resuming executions since taking office last year, attended the execution of Jessie Hoffman on Tuesday night at Angola. Hoffman became the first person in the state to be executed using nitrogen hypoxia, a new and controversial method previously used only in Alabama. Since last year, Alabama has executed four inmates using nitrogen gas.
Hoffman was on death row for the 1996 kidnapping, rape, and murder of 28-year-old Mary “Molly” Elliot.
His execution was the first in Louisiana in 15 years. The last person executed in the state was Gerald Bordelon, who was put to death by lethal injection in 2010 for the rape and murder of his 12-year-old stepdaughter, Courtney LeBlanc.
Louisiana turned to nitrogen hypoxia as an alternative execution method after the drugs needed for lethal injection became impossible to obtain.
Currently, 55 men and one woman are facing the death penalty in Louisiana. These are the death row inmates from the Baton Rouge area.
Ascension
- Daniel Blank has confessed to killing six people in the River Parishes from 1996-97. He was sentenced to death for the 1997 fatal stabbing of 71-year-old Lillian Phillippe of Gonzales.
Assumption
- James Dunn was sentenced to death after authorities said he took part in a 1998 armed robbery at a Napoleonville bank during which employees Jacqueline Blanchard and Lisa Dupuis were killed.
East Baton Rouge
- Anthony Bell was sentenced to die for murdering his wife, 24-year-old Erica Bell, and four other people in a May 2006 mass shooting at a Baton Rouge church. The other victims were: husband-and-wife Leonard and Gloria Howard, ages 78 and 72, respectively; Dolores McGrew, 67; and Darlene Selvage, 47.
- David Bowie strangled John Smith after losing all of his money to him in a dice game, according to court records. Police said Bowie used shoelaces and the cord of a clothing iron murder Smith.
- Quincy Broaden fatally shot Edward Black, 41, in 1996 over a drug debt, according to prosecutors. Police said Broaden also killed Allan Rutledge, 41, at a separate location in Scotlandville because he might have witnessed Black’s murder.
- Henry Broadway was found guilty of the 1993 shooting death of Baton Rouge Police Officer Cpl. Betty Smothers, 36, during an attempted armed robbery. Smothers was the mother of former Florida State and NFL running back Warrick Dunn.
- Gregory Brown was found guilty in the 1998 murders of William and Ann Gay, ages 62 and 60, respectively. The man and woman were shot at close range after a robbery spree that police said involved Brown and four accomplices. Brown was going from house to house looking for a getaway vehicle when he killed the Gays.
- Dacarius Holliday beat his then girlfriend’s 2-year-old son, Darian Coon, to death in 2007 in Baton Rouge, according to investigators.
- Robert Miller was given the death penality for the robbery, rape and fatal stabbing of his 67-year-old landlord in 1997. The woman was not identified in court records.
- Allen Robertson faces capital punishment for killing Baton Rouge husband-and-wife Morris and Kazuko Presetenback, ages 76 and 71, respectively, on Jan. 1, 1991. Police said Robertson broke into their home with the intent of stealing something he could sell for money to buy drugs.
- Antoine Tate was convicted for his role in the 1997 shooting deaths of Joseph Billie, Chonner Jackson and Sylvester Rowe in Baton Rouge. Police said Tate and his four accomplices were stealing drugs and money from the victims.
- Todd Wessinger was sentenced to death for the fatal shooting of two of his co-workers, David Breakwell and Stephanie Guzzardo, during a 1995 robbery at Calendar’s restaurant in Baton Rouge. Wayne Guzzardo, the father of one of the murder victims, has been among the most vocal proponents for resuming executions in Louisiana.
Livingston
- James Copeland raped and killed 11-year-old Joseph Cook Owen in Livingston Parish in 1979, investigators said.
West Baton Rouge
- Michael Garcia of Michigan was sentenced to death for the 2006 murder of Michael Millican, 32, near a Port Allen gas station. Police said Garcia and two accomplices robbed Millican and his girlfriend of $30. Before he was stabbed to death, investigators said Millican was restrained and beaten while forced to watch and his girlfriend being raped repeatedly.
West Feliciana
- David Brown was part of the Angola 5, a group of five inmates who took three correctional officers hostage at Louisiana State Penitentiary in 1999. Capt. David Knapps was killed in their unsuccessful escape attempt.
- Another member of the Angola 5, Jeffrey Clark, faces the death penalty for Knapps’ murder. Clark was in prison for life for killing his co-worker, Andrew Cheswick, at a Baton Rouge lounge in 1984.
Editor’s Note: The following article includes information originally published by Greg LaRose and Louisiana Illuminator, an independent, nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization with a mission to cast light on how decisions in Baton Rouge are made and how they affect the lives of everyday Louisianians.
Read more from The Louisiana Illuminator @ www.lailluminator.com
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