Virginia Carries Out First Execution This Year

The 32nd Execution of 2011

Virgina executed Jerry Terrell Jackson by lethal injection at the Greensville Correctional Center south of Richmond, reported Reuters.

Jackson, on death row since 2003, entered the Williamsburg apartment of an 88-year-old woman on August 26, 2001. He told police he did not know she was home.

But she was lying in bed at the time and confronted Jackson. She told him to take what he wanted and leave, but he held a pillow against her face until she stopped screaming, raping her at the same time, reported Reuters.

After killing the woman, Jackson left the apartment through a back window with $60. He stole her car and used the money to purchase marijuana.

Her body was found by her son after she did not attend church or answer her telephone.

A fingerprint on a piece of paper inside a wallet next to the woman's bed and DNA from hair found on and around her body implicated Jackson, and a jury found him guilty of capital murder.

According to Reuters, Jackson met with family members, his spiritual advisor and attorneys. He requested a last meal but asked for details to remain private. Jackson made no final statement.
He was pronounced dead at 9:14 p.m.

Jackson was the first inmate to be put to death in Virginia this year, and the first ever in that state to be executed with a drug mixture that included pentobarbital, a sedative.

According to Reuters, there were no complications with the execution. Virginia, like other states, switched to using pentobarbital instead of sodium thiopental in its lethal injection regime after the sole U.S. supplier of sodium thiopental recently ceased production.

To read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/19/us-virginia-execution-idUSTRE77I09K20110819