Rainey Bethea
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Rainey Bethea ( – August 14, 1936), was the last person publicly
executed Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty and formerly called judicial homicide, is the state-sanctioned killing of a person as punishment for actual or supposed misconduct. The sentence (law), sentence ordering that an offender b ...
in the
United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
. Bethea, who confessed to the rape and killing of a 70-year-old woman named Lischia Edwards, was convicted of her rape and publicly hanged in
Owensboro, Kentucky Owensboro is a Home rule in the United States, home rule-class city in Daviess County, Kentucky, United States, of which it is also the county seat. It is the List of cities in Kentucky, fourth-most populous city in the state. Owensboro is loca ...
.


Biography


Early life

Little is known about Bethea's life before he arrived in Owensboro in 1933. Born around 1909 in
Roanoke, Virginia Roanoke ( ) is an Independent city (United States), independent city in Virginia, United States. It lies in Southwest Virginia, along the Roanoke River, in the Blue Ridge Mountains, Blue Ridge range of the greater Appalachian Mountains. Roanok ...
, Bethea was an African-American man orphaned after the death of his mother in 1919 and his father in 1926. He worked for the Rutherford family and lived in their basement for about a year, and then he moved to a cabin behind the house of a man named Emmett Wells. He worked as a laborer and later rented a room from a woman, Mrs. Charles Brown. He also attended a
Baptist Baptists are a Christian denomination, denomination within Protestant Christianity distinguished by baptizing only professing Christian believers (believer's baptism) and doing so by complete Immersion baptism, immersion. Baptist churches ge ...
church. Bethea's first run-in with the law happened in 1935, when he was charged with breach of the peace and then fined $20. In April of the same year, he was caught stealing two purses from the Vogue Beauty Shop. Since the value of the purses exceeded $25, Bethea was convicted of a felony,
grand larceny Larceny is a crime involving the unlawful taking or theft of the personal property of another person or business. It was an offence under the common law of England and became an offence in jurisdictions which incorporated the common law of Eng ...
, and consequently sentenced to one year in the Kentucky State Penitentiary at Eddyville. He arrived there on June 1, 1935, and his prison physical exam information describes him as 5 ft. inches (1.635 m) tall and weighing . He gained
parole Parole, also known as provisional release, supervised release, or being on paper, is a form of early release of a prisoner, prison inmate where the prisoner agrees to abide by behavioral conditions, including checking-in with their designated ...
half a year later on December 1, 1935. Upon returning to Owensboro upon release, Bethea continued to work as a laborer and earned about seven dollars per week. Less than a month later, he was arrested again for house breaking. On January 6, 1936, the court amended this charge to being drunk and disorderly in public and imposed a $100 fine (equivalent to $ in ). Because he could not afford to pay, he remained incarcerated in the Daviess County Jail until April 18, 1936.


Crime and arrest

During the early morning of June 7, 1936, Bethea entered the home of Lishia Rarick Edwards on East Fifth Street by climbing onto the roof of an outbuilding next door. From there, he jumped onto the roof of the servant's quarters of Emmett Wells' house, and then walked down a wooden walkway. He climbed over the kitchen roof to Edwards' bedroom window. After removing a screen from her window, he entered the room, waking her. Bethea then choked Edwards and violently raped her. After she was unconscious, he searched for valuables and stole several of her rings. In the process, he removed his own black
celluloid Celluloids are a class of materials produced by mixing nitrocellulose and camphor, often with added dyes and other agents. Once much more common for its use as photographic film before the advent of safer methods, celluloid's common present-day ...
prison ring, and failed to later retrieve it. He left the bedroom and hid the stolen jewels in a barn not far from the house. The crime was discovered late that morning after the Smith family, who lived downstairs, noticed they had not heard Edwards stirring in her room. They feared she might have been ill and knocked on the door of her room, attempting to rouse her. They found the door locked with a key still inside the lock from the inside, which prevented another key from being placed in the lock from the outside. They contacted a neighbor, Robert Richardson, hoping he could help, and he managed to knock the key free, but another skeleton key would not unlock the door. Smith then got a ladder. He climbed into the room through the transom over the door and discovered that Edwards was dead. The Smiths alerted Dr. George Barr while he was attending a service at the local
Methodist Church Methodism, also called the Methodist movement, is a Protestant Christianity, Christian Christian tradition, tradition whose origins, doctrine and practice derive from the life and teachings of John Wesley. George Whitefield and John's brother ...
. Dr. Barr realized there was not much he could do and summoned the local
coroner A coroner is a government or judicial official who is empowered to conduct or order an inquest into the manner or cause of death. The official may also investigate or confirm the identity of an unknown person who has been found dead within th ...
, Delbert Glenn, who attended the same church. The Smiths also called the Owensboro police. Officers found the room was otherwise tidy, but there were muddy footprints everywhere. Coroner Glenn also found Bethea's celluloid prison ring. By late Sunday afternoon, the police already suspected Rainey Bethea after several residents of Owensboro stated that they had previously seen Bethea wearing the ring. Since Bethea had a criminal record, the police could use the then-new identification technique of
fingerprint A fingerprint is an impression left by the friction ridges of a human finger. The recovery of partial fingerprints from a crime scene is an important method of forensic science. Moisture and grease on a finger result in fingerprints on surfa ...
s to establish that Bethea had recently touched items inside the bedroom. Police searched for Bethea over the next four days. On the Wednesday following the discovery of the murder, Burt "Red" Figgins was working on the bank of the
Ohio River The Ohio River () is a river in the United States. It is located at the boundary of the Midwestern and Southern United States, flowing in a southwesterly direction from Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to its river mouth, mouth on the Mississippi Riv ...
, when he observed Bethea lying under some bushes. Figgins asked Bethea what he was doing, and Bethea responded he was "cooling off." Figgins then reported this sighting to his supervisor, Will Faith, and asked him to call the police. By the time Faith had returned to the spot on the river bank, Bethea had moved to the nearby Koll's Grocery. Faith followed him and then found a policeman in the drugstore, but when they searched for Bethea, he again eluded capture. Later that afternoon, Bethea was again spotted. This time, he was cornered on the river bank after he tried to board a
barge A barge is typically a flat-bottomed boat, flat-bottomed vessel which does not have its own means of mechanical propulsion. Original use was on inland waterways, while modern use is on both inland and ocean, marine water environments. The firs ...
. When police officers questioned him, he denied that he was Bethea, claiming his name was James Smith. The police played along with the fabricated name, fearing a mob would develop if residents were to learn that they had captured Bethea. After his arrest, Bethea was identified by a scar on the left side of his head.


Trial

Judge Forrest A. Roby of the Daviess Circuit Court ordered the sheriff to transport Bethea to the Jefferson County Jail in
Louisville Louisville is the most populous city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky, sixth-most populous city in the Southeast, and the 27th-most-populous city in the United States. By land area, it is the country's 24th-largest city; however, by populatio ...
. While being transferred, Bethea made his first confession, admitting that he had raped Edwards and strangled her to death. Bethea also lamented the fact that he had made a mistake by leaving his ring at the crime scene, stating that he had removed the ring in order to try on Edwards's rings. On June 12, 1936, Bethea confessed a second time, telling the guards where he had hidden the stolen jewelry. Owensboro police searched a barn in Owensboro and found the jewelry where Bethea said he had left it. Under Kentucky law, the
grand jury A grand jury is a jury empowered by law to conduct legal proceedings, investigate potential criminal conduct, and determine whether criminal charges should be brought. A grand jury may subpoena physical evidence or a person to testify. A grand ju ...
could not convene until June 22, and the prosecutor charged Bethea solely with rape. Under extant state statutes, executions for murder and robbery were carried out by
electrocution Electrocution is death or severe injury caused by electric shock from electric current passing through the body. The word is derived from "electro" and "execution", but it is also used for accidental death. The term "electrocution" was coined ...
at the state penitentiary in Eddyville. Rape, however, could be punished by public hanging in the county seat where the crime occurred. Bethea was never charged with the remaining crimes of theft, robbery, burglary, giving a false name to police, or murder. After one hour and forty minutes, the grand jury returned an indictment, charging Bethea with rape. On June 25, 1936, officers returned Bethea to Owensboro for the trial, which took place that same day. Bethea asserted a Clyde Maddox would provide an alibi, but Maddox claimed he did not know Bethea. The defense subpoenaed four witnesses: Maddox, Ladd Moorman, Willie Johnson (a supposed accomplice given Bethea's statements), and Allen McDaniel. The first three were served; however, the sheriff's office could not find a person named Allen McDaniel. On the night before the trial, Bethea announced to his lawyers that he wanted to plead guilty, doing so the next day at the start of the trial. The prosecutor still presented the state's case to the jury in spite of the guilty plea, requesting a death penalty for Bethea. In his opening statement, Commonwealth's Attorney Herman Birkhead said, "This is one of the most dastardly, beastly, cowardly crimes ever committed in Daviess County. Justice demands and the Commonwealth will ask and expect a verdict of the death penalty by hanging." After questioning 21 witnesses, the prosecution closed its case. The defense did not present or examine any witnesses. After a closing statement by the prosecutor, the judge instructed the jury that since Bethea had pleaded guilty, they must "...fix his punishment, at confinement in the penitentiary for not less than ten years nor more than twenty years, or at death." After only four and a half minutes of deliberation, the jury returned with a sentence of death by hanging. Bethea was then quickly removed from the courthouse and returned to the Jefferson County Jail. In all, Bethea's trial lasted for three hours.


Appeal and petition for habeas corpus

Back in Louisville, Bethea acquired five new African-American lawyers to try to save his life: Charles Ewbank Tucker, Stephen A. Burnley, Charles W. Anderson Jr., Harry E. Bonaparte, and R. Everett Ray. They worked ''pro bono'' to challenge the sentence, which they saw as their ethical duty for the indigent defendant who could not pay standard legal fees. On July 10, 1936, they filed a motion for a new trial. The judge summarily denied this on the grounds that under Section 273 of the Kentucky Code of Practice in Criminal Cases, a motion for a new trial had to have been received before the end of the court's term, which had ended on July 4. Bethea's team then tried to appeal to the
Kentucky Court of Appeals The Kentucky Court of Appeals is the lower of Kentucky Kentucky (, ), officially the Commonwealth of Kentucky, is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders Illino ...
, which was also not in session at that time. On July 29, Justice Gus Thomas returned to Frankfort where he heard the oral motion. Justice Thomas refused to let them file the appeal, on the grounds that the trial court record was incomplete since it only included the judge's ruling. While the lawyers knew that the Kentucky courts would deny the appeal, they filed it anyway as a formality in order to exhaust the state court remedies available to them before they filed a petition for
writ of habeas corpus ''Habeas corpus'' (; from Medieval Latin, ) is a legal procedure invoking the jurisdiction of a court to review the unlawful detention or imprisonment of an individual, and request the individual's custodian (usually a prison official) to ...
in a federal court. Once Thomas denied the motion to file a belated appeal, Bethea's attorneys filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Kentucky at Louisville. On August 5, a hearing was held at the Federal Building in Louisville before United States District Judge Elwood Hamilton. During the hearing, Bethea claimed that he had pled guilty unwillingly and had wanted to subpoena three witnesses to testify on his behalf, but his initial lawyers had forced him to plead guilty and did not have the desired witnesses testify. He also claimed that his five confessions had been made under
duress Coercion involves compelling a party to act in an involuntary manner through the use of threats, including threats to use force against that party. It involves a set of forceful actions which violate the free will of an individual in order to i ...
and that he had signed one confession unaware of what he was signing. The Commonwealth brought several witnesses to refute these claims. Ultimately, Judge Hamilton denied the habeas corpus petition and ruled that the hanging could proceed.


Execution

While the crime was infamous locally, it came to nationwide attention because the
sheriff A sheriff is a government official, with varying duties, existing in some countries with historical ties to England where the office originated. There is an analogous, although independently developed, office in Iceland, the , which is common ...
of Daviess County was a woman. Florence Shoemaker Thompson had become sheriff on April 13, 1936, after her husband, sheriff Everett Thompson, unexpectedly died of
pneumonia Pneumonia is an Inflammation, inflammatory condition of the lung primarily affecting the small air sacs known as Pulmonary alveolus, alveoli. Symptoms typically include some combination of Cough#Classification, productive or dry cough, ches ...
on April 10. Shoemaker became sheriff through
widow's succession Widow's succession was a political practice prominent in some countries in the early part of the 20th century, by which a politician who died in office was directly succeeded by his widow, either through election or direct appointment to the seat ...
, and as sheriff of the county, she was tasked with hanging Bethea. Arthur L. Hash, a former Louisville police officer, offered his services free of charge to perform the execution. Thompson accepted this offer. He asked that she not make his name public. Hash arrived at the site intoxicated wearing a white suit and a white Panama hat. At this time, no one but he and Thompson knew that he would pull the trigger. On August 6, the
Governor of Kentucky The governor of the Commonwealth of Kentucky is the head of government of the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Kentucky. Sixty-two men and one woman have served as governor of Kentucky. The governor's term is four years in length; sinc ...
, Albert Chandler, signed Bethea's
execution warrant An execution warrant (also called a death warrant or a black warrant) is a writ that authorizes the Capital punishment, execution of a capital punishment, condemned person. United States In the United States, either a judicial or executi ...
and set the execution for
sunrise Sunrise (or sunup) is the moment when the upper rim of the Sun appears on the horizon in the morning, at the start of the Sun path. The term can also refer to the entire process of the solar disk crossing the horizon. Terminology Although the S ...
on August 14. Thompson requested the governor to issue a revised death warrant because the original warrant specified that the hanging would take place in the courthouse yard where the county had recently planted, at significant cost, new shrubs and flowers. Chandler was out-of-state, so
Lieutenant Governor of Kentucky The lieutenant governor of Kentucky was created under the state's second constitution, which was ratified in 1799. The inaugural officeholder was Alexander Scott Bullitt, who took office in 1800 following his election to serve under James Garra ...
Keen Johnson, as acting governor, signed a second death warrant moving the location of the hanging from the courthouse yard to an empty lot near the county garage. Rainey Bethea's last meal consisted of
fried chicken Fried chicken, also called Southern fried chicken, is a dish consisting of chicken pieces that have been coated with seasoned flour or batter and pan-fried, deep fried, pressure fried, or air fried. The breading adds a crisp coating or ...
, pork chops, mashed potatoes,
pickled cucumber A pickled cucumber – commonly known as a pickle in the United States, Canada and Australia and a gherkin ( ) in Britain, Ireland, South Africa, and New Zealand – is a usually small or miniature cucumber that has been Pickling, pickled in ...
s,
cornbread Cornbread is a quick bread made with cornmeal, associated with the cuisine of the Southern United States, with origins in Native American cuisine. It is an example of batter bread. Dumplings and pancakes made with finely ground cornmeal are st ...
, lemon pie, and
ice cream Ice cream is a frozen dessert typically made from milk or cream that has been flavoured with a sweetener, either sugar or an alternative, and a spice, such as Chocolate, cocoa or vanilla, or with fruit, such as strawberries or peaches. Food ...
, which he ate at 4:00 p.m. on August 13 in Louisville. At about 1:00 a.m., Daviess County deputy sheriffs transported Bethea from Louisville to Owensboro. At the Daviess County Jail, professional hangman Phil Hanna of Epworth, Illinois, visited Bethea and instructed him to stand on the X that would be marked on the trapdoor. Bethea left the Daviess County Jail at 5:21 a.m. and walked with two deputies to the scaffold. Within two minutes, he was at the base of the scaffold. Removing his shoes, he put on a new pair of socks. He ascended the steps and stood on the large X as instructed. After Bethea made his final confession to Fr Herman J. Lammers of the Cathedral of the Assumption in Louisville, who had also supervised Bethea's conversion to
Catholicism The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...
during Bethea's incarceration at the Jefferson County Jail two weeks prior to the execution, officers placed a black hood over his head and fastened three large straps around his ankles, thighs, arms, and chest. Hanna placed the noose around Bethea's neck, adjusted it, and then signaled to Hash to pull the trigger. Instead, Hash, who was drunk, did nothing. Hanna shouted at Hash, "Do it!" A deputy then leaned onto the trigger, which sprang the trap door. Bethea fell 8 feet (2.4 m), and his neck was instantly broken. Afterward, two doctors confirmed he was dead. His body was taken to Andrew & Wheatley Funeral Home. He wanted his body to be sent to his sister in
South Carolina South Carolina ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders North Carolina to the north and northeast, the Atlantic Ocean to the southeast, and Georgia (U.S. state), Georg ...
so that she could arrange for him to be interred next to his father, but against these wishes, he was buried in a pauper's grave at the Rosehill Elmwood Cemetery in Owensboro. It was estimated that a crowd of about 20,000 people gathered to watch the execution. Afterwards, Hanna complained that Hash should not have been allowed to perform the execution in his drunken condition. Hanna further said it was the worst display he experienced in the 70 hangings he had supervised. The spot where the scaffold stood (approximately 37.775248° -87.116462°) is now part of a drop-off/pick-up lane in front of the Owensboro Convention Center.


End of public executions in Kentucky

As the
Kentucky General Assembly The Kentucky General Assembly, also called the Kentucky Legislature, is the state legislature of the U.S. state of Kentucky. It comprises the Kentucky Senate and the Kentucky House of Representatives. The General Assembly meets annually in th ...
had been meeting in its biennial sessions at the time, the media circus surrounding the Bethea execution embarrassed members of the Kentucky legislature. In spite of the humiliation, they could not amend laws regarding executions until the next session in 1938. However, the trial judges in two separate Kentucky rape cases ordered that the hangings of John "Pete" Montjoy and Harold Van Venison be conducted privately. Montjoy, age 23, was privately hanged in Covington on December 17, 1937. On January 17, 1938, William R. Attkisson of the Kentucky State Senate's 38th District (representing Louisville), introduced Senate Bill 69, repealing the requirement in Section 1137 that executions for convicted rapists be conducted by hanging in the county seat where they raped their victims. The bill was promoted in the
Kentucky House of Representatives The Kentucky House of Representatives is the lower house of the Kentucky General Assembly. It is composed of 100 Representatives elected from single-member districts throughout the Commonwealth. Not more than two counties can be joined to form a ...
by Representative Charles W. Anderson Jr., one of the attorneys who assisted Bethea in his post-conviction relief motions. After both houses approved the bill, Governor Chandler signed it into law on March 12, 1938; it became effective on May 30 of that year. Chandler later expressed regret at having approved the repeal, claiming, "Our streets are no longer safe." The last person ever legally hanged in Kentucky was Harold Van Venison, a 33-year-old African-American singer, who was privately executed in Covington on June 3, 1938.


See also

* List of people executed in Kentucky *
Capital punishment in the United States In the United States, capital punishment (also known as the death penalty) is a legal penalty in 27 states (of which two, Oregon and Wyoming, do not currently have any inmates sentenced to death), throughout the country at the federal leve ...


Footnotes


References

* Ryan, Perry T. (1992). . . * "Word for Word; The Last Hanging There Was a Reason They Outlawed Public Executions." ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
.'' (May 6, 2001) Note: Despite its title, this article explains that 1936 journalists exaggerated claims that the crowd was unruly or disrespectful during Bethea's execution.* *


Notes


External links

*
After 75 years, nation's last public hanging haunts Owensboro, Brett Barrouquere, Associated Press, August 13, 2011

Photos You Won't Find In Your History Books
The last ever public execution in the United States, 1936.

Text plus audio of statement from two witnesses of the hanging, May 1, 2001 {{DEFAULTSORT:Bethea, Rainey 1900s births 1936 deaths 20th-century American murderers American people executed for rape People from Roanoke, Virginia Executed people from Virginia 20th-century executions by Kentucky People executed by Kentucky by hanging Executed African-American people 20th-century executions of American people People executed by public hanging People from Owensboro, Kentucky American male criminals 20th-century African-American people Violence against women in Kentucky