On this day, Sept. 3, in 2003, former Presbyterian minister Paul Jennings Hill became the first person executed for killing a doctor who performed abortions.
On July 29, 1994, Hill used a shotgun to kill Dr. John Britton and his bodyguard, retired Lt. Col. James Barrett, outside a Pensacola, Fla., clinic. He also wounded Barrett’s wife.
At the time, the slayings were part of a tide of violence against abortion providers in the United States.
Hill tried to claim that the killings were justifiable because he was preventing the murder of unborn children. The judge dismissed that argument and Hill refused to present any other defense.
In a statement before his death, Hill said he felt no remorse. He claimed that he would become a martyr and said he expected “a great reward in heaven.”
During his last words, he evoked the writings of abolitionist John Brown and encouraged supporters to use lethal force to stop abortion. Hill left behind a manifesto titled “Mix My Blood with the Blood of the Unborn.”
– Scott McCabe
