BULLET...TEXAS LAST MEAL--RICARDO ORTIZ--1/29/09...

TEXAS LAST MEAL
RICARDO ORTIZ
Jan. 29, 2009

Ortiz had no final meal request.

Complete skinny coming later in the week.

BULLET...TEXAS LAST MEAL--VIRGIL EURISTI MARTINEZ--1/28/09...

TEXAS LAST MEAL
VIRGIL EURISTI MARTINEZ
January 28, 2009

Martinez had a final meal request of two fried chicken breast, two pork chops, seven flour tortillas, avocados and french fries.


Complete skinny coming later in the week.

TEXAS LAST MEAL--REGINALD PERKINS--01/22/09

TEXAS LAST MEAL
REGINALD PERKINS
Jan. 22, 2009

...Perkins pleaded guilty to the 1980 rape and attempted rape of two 12-year-old girls in Ohio and was sentenced to life in prison...In 1988, he was paroled...

Last Meal: Perkins had a final meal request of twenty four hot bbq chicken wings, two cheeseburgers with everything, four slices of pizza with jalapenos, three slices of buttered toast, one sweet potato pie, sherbert rainbow ice cream and twelve Dr. Pepper/Big Red.

The skinny: Perkins, a convicted rapist and suspected serial killer was executed for strangling and robbing his stepmother in Fort Worth more than eight years ago.

More skinny: Perkins was condemned for the 2000 slaying of his 64-year-old stepmother, whose body was found stuffed in the trunk of her Cadillac. He led his father and police to his stepmother's body.

Evidence at his trial showed Perkins pawned her wedding ring and wrote fraudulent checks from the account of the family trucking business in Fort Worth. He became a suspect after detectives learned of his previous convictions in Ohio.

Priors and priors and priors: Perkins pleaded guilty to the 1980 rape and attempted rape of two 12-year-old girls in Ohio and was sentenced to life in prison.

Authorities suspected but couldn't get enough evidence to charge him with the 1980 strangling of a Cleveland woman. Perkins was living with the victim's twin sister and later married her.

He was suspected of the 1981 strangling of another Cleveland woman in her apartment, and the strangling three weeks later of a man, whose daughter he was convicted of trying to rape.

In 1988, he was paroled and moved to Fort Worth.

A parole violation returned him to Ohio in 1993 and remained in prison until 2000, when he was paroled again and returned again to Fort Worth. His stepmother's slaying occurred 10 months later.

A DNA database tied Perkins last year to a pair of 1991 stranglings in Fort Worth.

Leading up to: About an hour before he was executed, Perkins had summoned a prison official to his cell and gave him a statement professing his innocence.

"They didn't link me to nothing. I did not kill my stepmom," he said. "I loved her. Texas is going to kill an innocent man."

On the other deaths, Perkins said, "There's other suspects they questioned besides me. They let them go. I don't know what they're talking about. I can't tell you who killed them. I ain't killed nobody. I've never killed."

Last words and such: Asked by the warden if he would like to make a statement, Perkins responded, "I already made my statement. Appreciate it. Love y'all."

As the drugs were being administered, he said, "I can feel it going in." Just before the drugs took effect, he looked at the sister of his victim and told her he loved her.

He was pronounced dead at 6:24 p.m., eight minutes after the lethal drugs began to flow.

"I think he waited a little bit too late to tell me that he loved me," the victim's sister, said. She also said if Perkins insisted he was innocent, "He should have told who did it."

Factoids: Perkins was the...

5th murderer executed in U.S. in 2009
1141st murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
3rd murderer executed in Texas in 2009
426th murderer executed in Texas since 1976

OKLAHOMA LAST MEAL
DARWIN DEMOND BROWN
January 22, 2009

...inmates are limited to $15 for their last meals request. Food must be available in the McAlester area...

Last Meal: Brown had a final meal request of barbecue ribs, chopped beef, hot links, baked beans, plain potato chips, coconut doughnuts and chocolate milk.

Inmates are limited to $15 for their last meals request. Food must be available in the McAlester area.

The skinny: Brown, 32, was executed for beating a convenience store clerk to death with a baseball bat nearly 14 years ago.

More skinny: Brown and three other men were convicted of killing a man during the robbery of a QuikTrip store in Tulsa.

The victim's bound and battered body was discovered by a customer in the store's walk-in refrigerator in a pool of blood, milk and beer.

Michael L. Wilson was a co-worker of the victim and took a post behind the counter to wait on customers as the man lay dying in the cooler.

The defendants then loaded two safes into Wilson's car using a dolly from the QuikTrip. When Wilson failed to show up for work at the scheduled time of 3:00 p.m. on the same day, surveillance was set on Wilson's house.

Shortly thereafter Wilson was spotted getting into a gray vehicle. The vehicle was stopped. All four defendants were taken into custody. Later, at the police station, money was recovered from all of the defendants except Wilson. The next day Wilson's mother called officers to her house. Once there, the detectives found several items of evidence on the front porch, including the baseball bat, a bloody QuikTrip jacket with the victim's name on it, and Wilson's Nike jacket matching the one worn in the store video.

Two of the co-defendants, Billy D. Alverson, 37, and Wilson, 33, also got death sentences and are awaiting execution.

Richard J. Harjo, another defendant who was 17 at the time of the crime, received a no-parole life sentence,

When he was killed, the victim had just received his real estate license.

The D.A. remembers: Former Tulsa County District Attorney Bill LaFortune..."All murders are terrible crimes. But I think this crime and this murder was as barbaric a crime as we’ve ever seen in Tulsa County.

"The strongest piece of evidence — the surveillance tape — has to be one of the most compelling pieces of evidence ever presented to a jury anywhere, in my opinion.”

Youth: Brown's life of crime began at 15 years old when he was arrested in Tulsa with a loaded .25-caliber handgun. Brown's delinquency escalated over the next few years with assault and a drug offense.

Failed appeal: The state Pardon and Parole Board denied clemency for Brown on Jan. 7, and Brown's attorney, James Hankins, said his client had exhausted all of his appeals. Hankins had not denied that Brown participated in the killing, but appealed to the parole board to spare his client's life because he was just 18 years old when the killing happened and two of Brown's co-defendants were the "primary movers" behind the robbery.

But prosecutors argued the killing was particularly grisly and played a portion of a surveillance tape from the store in which the victim could be heard screaming for help after being dragged into the store's cooler.

Leading up to: Inmates banged on their cell doors and building pipes shortly before the execution, which has been done in the past when death sentences are carried out.

Last words and such: Brown spoke words of remorse Thursday.

"I apologize for anybody I hurt,” he said while strapped to a gurney with tubes in his arms. "I’m sorry to everybody. … I’d like to thank all of my family for the support that they’ve given me.”

Looking through the glass of the witness room, Brown mouthed "I love you” to his father.

Brown's father responded: "I love you Darwin."

Lethal drugs were injected into Brown beginning at 6:05 p.m.

As the concoction began to take effect, Brown’s eyes rolled back and his mouth opened slightly. Seconds later, he rose up slightly to cough several times. He released a couple of gasps before becoming still, his eyes and mouth half-open.

"That's my baby," Mr. Brown said as his son stopped breathing and the color slowly drained from Darwin Brown's face.

He was pronounced dead at 6:11 p.m.

Factoids: Brown was the...

4th murderer executed in U.S. in 2009
1140th murderer executed in U.S. since 1976
1st murderer executed in Oklahoma in 2008
89th murderer executed in Oklahoma since 1976