Velma Barfield becomes the first woman to be executed by lethal injection.
Barfield, a 53-year-old grandmother and a serial poisoner, also became the first woman in the United States to be executed since 1962.
Known as the “Deathrow Grandma,” Barfield confessed to fatally poisoning four people with arsenic, including her mother and boyfriend.
In 1970, after her first husband died in a suspicious fire, she married Jennings Barfield. Less than a year later, Jennings died from heart complications.
In 1974, her mother, Lillian Bullard, showed symptoms of intense diarrhea, vomiting and nausea, resulting in her death. In 1976, Barfield worked as a caretaker for Dollie Edwards, 85. Dollie experienced identical symptoms to that of Velma’s mother and she also died.
Another victim was Stuart Taylor, Barfield’s boyfriend. Fearing he discovered she had been forging checks on his account, she mixed rat poison into his beer. After her arrest, the body of Jennings Barfield was exhumed and found to have fatal amounts of arsenic.
