Capital punishment

Crime & Public Safety

Executions through the ages

Capital punishment is nearly as old as our species, but means and methods have changed many times over the years.

The Babylonian Code of Hammurabi, written in the 18th century BC, is the first known codificiation of capital punishment.

Many crimes were punishable by death under Mosaic Law. In addition to stoning, the ancient Hebrews employed hanging, beheading, and crucifixion, which they adopted from the Romans.

Crucifiction was practiced by the Roman Empire, including the most famous execution in history, of Jesus in about 29 AD. Three centuries later, the Emperor Constantine outlawed crucifixion after converting to Christianity.

Executions were common in 10th centruy Britain, but William the Conquerer opposed deaths except in war and abolished capital punishment. Criminals could still be maimed as a punishment, however.

Crushing or pressing was one of the more grotesque medieval methods. In Asia, it was often accomplished by using elephants.

Witchcraft hysteria erupted in Europe starting around 1500 and didn't die out for nearly two centuries. During those years, witches were burned by the hundreds across the continent. However, no witches were burned in the Salem witch trials.

Death by the sword was once practiced in Europe, but vanished centuries ago. It is still employed in some Middle Eastern societies, notably by terrorist organizations such as ISIS, to outrage in the West.

Executing criminals by means of a suspended blade was common in various parts of Europe for centuries. But the device we know as the guillotine will forever be a symbol of the excesses of the French Revolution.

Death by firing squad is almost as old as firearms themselves, although in American history it is more commonly associated with the military than with capital punishment through the civilian courts.

In 1608, Capt. George Kendall of the Jamestown Colony was the first person to be executed in the new American Colonies. Despite this illustration, he was killed by a firing squad.

Public hangings were sometimes perfomed en masse, including this 1893 execution of five men in Montgomery County, Ga.

On June 12, 1931, in Augusta, Arthur Meyers became the last person to be publicly hanged in Georgia. Artifacts associated with the execution are still on display.

In the era of public executions, the events sometimes took on a circus-like air. That came to an end with the last public execution, carried out in Owensboro, Ky., in 1936. The condemned was Rainey Bethea, convicted of raping and murdering a 70-year-old woman.

On August 6, 1890, William Kemmler of Buffalo, NY, became the first person executed via the electric chair.

Death by electrocution became illegal in Georgia in 2001, when the state Supreme Court ruled that it violated the Constitution's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.

Eula Thompson was tried and convicted for two Georgia murders. In the first case, involving the 1927 killing of a store keeper, she was sentenced to die in the electric chair, but her sentence was commuted and she was later freed. She was tried in the 1941 murder of her brother.

In 1945, Lena Baker was executed in Georgia's electric chair, the only woman ever to suffer that fate. She was convicted of killing a white man reputed to be her lover, who, she testified, had confined her by locking her in a grist mill.

On January 17, 1977, murderer Gary Gilmore was executed by a Utah firing squad. It was the first execution in the United States in 10 years and was immortalized by novelist Norman Mailer in "The Executioner's Song."

In 1921, Nevada was the first state to adopt the gas chamber as its means of execution, on the gounds that it was more humane. It was first used on February 8, 1924, to execute Gee Jon, a Chinese immigrant who was convicted of killing a member of a rival gang.

Nearly 200 people died in the gas chamber at California's San Quentin prison before the method was ruled cruel and unusual punishment in 1995.

On Dec. 7, 1982, murderer Charlie Brooks was put to death by lethal injection in Texas. He was the first. More than 1,200 people have died in the U.S. via lethal injection since that date.

From the inception of lethal injections in 1982, the method has come under scrutiny.

Over time, states have been forced to adopt different drug protocols, as many manufacturers have declined to make their drugs available for use in executions.

Georgia's death chamber. (credit: Ben Gray / bgray@ajc.com)

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