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US execution planned of killer who said witchcraft drove him

Federal Death Penalty History Q&A
Posted at 8:46 AM, Sep 22, 2020
and last updated 2020-09-22 08:46:56-04

CHICAGO (AP) — The Trump administration this week is set to resume this year's wave of federal executions following a 17-year hiatus.

If it goes ahead as scheduled Tuesday, William Emmett LeCroy would be the sixth federal death-row inmate executed this year at the U.S. prison in Terre Haute. Another is scheduled Thursday.

LeCroy said an obsession with witchcraft led him to slay a Georgia nurse to lift a spell he believed she put on him.

Lawyers asked President Donald Trump in a recent petition to commute LeCroy's sentence to life in prison. They mentioned that LeCroy's brother, Georgia State Trooper Chad LeCroy, was killed during a traffic stop in 2010 and that the death of another son would devastate the LeCroy family.