On April 23, 1998, Steven Moss was 37 years old when he and his two children were murdered by a pair of burglars in their late teens who invaded the Moss home in Jones County, Georgia.
Eighteen years later, on April 27, 2016, another 37-year-old has been killed: Daniel Anthony Lucas, one of the men who confessed to the Moss slayings.
The Mosses — dad Steven, 15-year-old Kristin and 11-year-old Bryan — were shot again and again with guns fired by Lucas and an accomplice.
Lucas, in contrast, was shot once with a needle filled with the barbiturate pentobarbital, administered Wednesday night by the state of Georgia in its fifth execution this year.
Since the death penalty was re-instated in the 1970s, Georgia has twice executed as many as five inmates in a year — in 2015 and 1987.
Lucas’ death at 9:54 p.m. came not long after the United States Supreme Court rejected his request for a stay of execution. The court’s response came about two hours after the originally scheduled 7 p.m. execution time had passed.
Final Words, Final Minutes
Lucas looked very different from his mugshot, sporting a mustache and a full beard.
He offered some final words:
“To the Moss family, I’m sorry for Mrs. Moss. And to family and friends, I love them.
“All beings are basically good, all beings are basically kind, all beings are basically strong, all beings are basically wise.”
He asked for a prayer, and once the warden left the execution chamber, Lucas closed his eyes and appeared to be praying. But his words did not reach the witnesses on the other side of the glass window because the microphone had been turned off.
Two minutes later, he opened his eyes, looked at a witness on the front row, then closed his eyes and never moved again.
Thirteen minutes later he was pronounced dead.
Food, Friends and Protesters
Lucas requested an Italian dinner for his final meal, including meat pizza and a steak and cheese calzone. He ate all of it, according to prison officials. He also recorded a final statement.
He received 15 visitors Wednesday afternoon — seven relatives, two friends, two clergy members, and four members of his legal team.
Wednesday evening, about 40 capital punishment protesters gathered near the entrance to the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification Prison property and, as they have done before, read the names of those who have been put to death in Georgia.
Mary Catherine Johnson, with Georgians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, called everyone into a circle and started talking about Lucas. She read a short passage from one of his journals and invited others who knew him to share their stories.
Buddhist reps handed out a sheet of prayers, which the group recited. (In Lucas' quickly rejected clemency petition to the State Board of Pardons and Paroles, he apologized for murdering the Mosses and said he'd begun to follow Buddhist teachings.)
The Right Rev. Rob Wright, bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Atlanta, gave an ecumenical prayer. Then the group sang "Amazing Grace."
Appeals and Rejections
The “no mercy” issued by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas followed similar nos issued earlier Wednesday, first by the Superior Court of Butts County, then by the Georgia Supreme Court.
The state Supreme Court even expressed its displeasure that Lucas’ lawyers filed their appeal a mere 31 hours before the slated hour of death:
“This Court notes that this successive habeas corpus proceeding was not initiated until the day before Lucas’s scheduled execution,” the judges wrote.
Lucas’ lawyers, however, filed that “last minute” court challenge several months after they’d exhausted the usual capital punishment appeals last fall.
Lucas’ accomplice in the triple murders, Brandon Rhode, was put to death in 2010.
The Crime That Killed a Family
What happened 18 years ago in the house on Griswoldville Road outside the tiny Middle Georgia town of Gray was detailed in Rhode’s and Lucas’ confessions, investigators’ reports and trial testimony.
Lucas was 19 and Rhode was 18 when they broke into the Moss house, looking for money and things to sell so they could buy drugs.
They were ransacking the house at the same time schools were letting out and children were heading home.
Bryan was the first Moss child to arrive home, and he could see Lucas and Rhode through the window.
The boy picked up an aluminum baseball bat and went inside to confront the men. But Lucas and Rhode saw the boy coming and were waiting, armed with .25-caliber and .357-caliber handguns.
Lucas shot and wounded the boy.
When the men saw Kristin walking up the driveway, they moved Bryan to another room and shot him again, this time killing him.
Then they shot Kristin.
Steven Moss, a truck driver, was killed moments after he stepped through the door.
To ensure the children were dead, Lucas shot all three again and again.
More Executions This Year?
Gerri Ann Moss found her family dead about an hour later. She has since moved out of state.
Maj. Earl Humphries and Capt. Jimmy Black of the Jones County Sheriff’s Office focused on Lucas and Rhode because there were people who knew of their plans to go to the Moss house, and there were witnesses who saw them leaving in a red car.
Two days after the murders, Lucas and Rhode were in custody.
There is one other Georgia death row inmate who has exhausted his appeals, meaning he could see his execution date set soon. That would make it six to die by lethal injection this year.
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