1. John Arthur Spenkelink was an American convicted murderer.
13 Facts About John Spenkelink
1. 2.
John Spenkelink was executed in 1979, the first convicted criminal to be executed in Florida after capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, and the second in the United States.
3.
At 12 years old, Spenkelink discovered the body of his alcoholic farmer father, who had committed suicide in his truck by carbon monoxide poisoning.
4.
John Spenkelink was arrested several times in his youth and was in and out of various jails and reform schools.
5.
John Spenkelink escaped from a California prison in 1972, where he was serving a five-years-to-life sentence for armed robbery of a fast food restaurant, five gas stations, and two people.
6.
On February 4,1973, the 24-year-old Spenkelink picked up hitchhiker Joseph J Szymankiewicz and checked into a hotel in Tallahassee, Florida.
7.
John Spenkelink appealed his sentence, but in 1977, Governor Reubin Askew of Florida signed John Spenkelink's first death warrant.
8.
John Spenkelink continued to appeal, earning stays from both the USCourt of Appeals and the US Supreme Court, but both stays were overturned, meaning that John Spenkelink would be the first man put to death involuntarily since executions were resumed in the US in 1977.
9.
John Spenkelink's case became a national cause celebre, encompassing both the broader debate over the morality of the death penalty and the narrower question of whether capital punishment fit John Spenkelink's crime.
10.
John Spenkelink's cause was taken up by former Florida Governor LeRoy Collins, actor Alan Alda, and singer Joan Baez, among many others.
11.
Governor Graham commissioned an investigation, which in September 1979 concluded that John Spenkelink had been "taunted" and had loud exchanges with prison guards and staff immediately before his execution, but had not been physically abused.
12.
In spite of the state's investigation, a rumor began that John Spenkelink had been murdered prior to his being brought into the death chamber.
13.
On March 6,1981, Los Angeles County Coroner Thomas Noguchi announced his finding that the cause of John Spenkelink's death was indeed electrocution.