ALABAMA LAST MEAL
DANNY JOE BRADLEY
February 12, 2009

Last Meal: Bradley, 49, had no final meal request. He had two fried egg sandwiches for breakfast and a snack during the day.

The skinny: Bradley was executed for the rape and strangulation of his 12-year-old stepdaughter.

More skinny: The victim and her younger brother were left in the care of their stepfather, Danny Joe Bradley. The mother of the children had been hospitalized for more than one week.

At approximately 8:00 p.m., the three were watching television. The victim was lying on the couch and asked her brother to wake her if she fell asleep so that she could move to the bedroom. When the brother decided to go to bed, Bradley told him not to wake the girl but to leave her on the couch. Bradley also told the boy to go to sleep in the room normally occupied by Mr. and Mrs. Bradley instead of his own bedroom.

The boy claimed that he had fallen asleep and that when he awoke, the victim was gone. Her body was found the next day in woods near Bradley's apartment. She had been raped, sodomized and strangled to death.

When he discovered her "missing," Bradley went to his in-laws, then to the next door neighbor, before going to the hospital. He claimed to police that he had not left the house before discovering her missing, but was witnessed by a police officer near where the body was eventually discovered. Her brother later testified that Bradley had frequently rendered the children unconscious by squeezing their necks. Fiber evidence from Bradley's home and trunk was also consistent with clothing and bedding fibers from the victim.

Previous: In 2001, the Alabama Supreme Court granted Bradley a stay only a week before his scheduled execution to allow DNA testing of bedding items. The victim's DNA and Bradley's DNA were mixed on a blanket that was on the girl's bed, according to court records. However, some critical evidence has been lost, including the rape kit and semen-stained clothing.

Last words and such: Bradley was given a lethal injection at 6:15 p.m. after spending 25 years on Alabama’s death row. He had no final statement.

Factoids: Bradley was the...

12th murderer executed in U.S. in 2009
1148th murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
2nd murderer executed in Alabama in 2009
40th murderer executed in Alabama since 1976

Alabama has 207 inmates on death row, including four women.