OHIO LAST MEAL
WILLIAM WICKLINE
March 30, 2004

...his supervisor at a prison slaughterhouse praised his butchering work as exceptional....
plus, butter pecan ice cream is quickly becoming the official deadmaneating ice cream flavor of 2004...

Last Meal: An eight-ounce filet mignon, medium rare; potato salad; six rolls with butter; fresh strawberries over shortcake; and butter pecan ice cream. He also received four packs of Pall Mall cigarettes and six cans of pop, including three of Mountain Dew.

The steak came from the prison kitchen. The other ingredients were bought at a local store for $11.66.

The skinny: Wickline was executed for strangling an unconscious woman with a rope in 1982 after slitting her husband's throat over a drug debt. The only witness said the former prison slaughterhouse worker cut up the bodies, which were never found.

Wickline was also charged with a murder in West Virginia, in which the victim was beheaded. That body was found on a bed and his head on a nearby nightstand.

Heads up: Teresa Kemp says she's been unable to sleep soundly for 22 years, still haunted by the image of her lover holding a man's severed head in his hand. ``Do you know I still walk into a bathroom sometimes and smell blood?'' Kemp wrote last month to the Ohio Parole Board. Trembling on the witness stand, Kemp provided the chief evidence that sent William D. Wickline to death row. She testified that he killed a Columbus couple over a $6,000 drug debt, butchered their bodies and recruited a friend to help throw the remains in trash bins.

The days before: Wickline slept about five hours Monday night and visited with his brothers early Tuesday. Wickline showered and shaved, and had two cups of coffee and Rice Krispies cereal. He then read the Bible and prayed.

Last words and such: Wickline's final statement was, "May tomorrow see the courts shaped by more wisdom and less politics."

Factoids... In 1978, his supervisor at a prison slaughterhouse praised Wickline's butchering work as exceptional.

Wickline was the...
21st murderer executed in U.S. in 2004
906th murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
3rd murderer executed in Ohio in 2004
11th murderer executed in Ohio since 1976