On this day, Dec. 7, in 1982, Texas murderer Charles Brooks Jr. became the first condemned prisoner in the world to be executed by lethal injection. Brooks was put to death for the 1976 kidnapping and murder of a Fort Worth mechanic.
The execution team could not find a suitable vein and had to get help from a doctor. At 12:09 a.m., the deadly dose was injected into Brooks’ body. At 12:16 a.m., he was pronounced dead.
Lethal injection was first proposed as a cheaper and more humane means of execution than past methods such as electrocution, hanging, firing squad, gas chamber and beheading.
Death by needle is now the most common form of execution in 37 states that allow the death penalty.
Scott McCabe
