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Last Words

By Steve Hall

Eric Dexheimer has posted, "Does who?s watching change a condemned man?s last words?" at the Austin American-Statesman Focal Point blog.  Here's an extended excerpt:If you knew your victim?s friends and relatives were watching your execution, would it change what you said just before the lethal cocktail started flowing? That?s the question behind this recent study of Texas?s death row inmates? final words. The hypothesis: That the presence of relatives and friends of victims during the execution more often provokes the condemned to offer expressions of guilt, or words of contrition and remorse.Why study this in Texas? Sheer numbers, for one. With more than a third of all of the nation?s executions occurring here, Texas is to executions what Nevada is to slots...continue to full post

Full post as published by StandDown Texas Project on March 12, 2010 (boomark / email).