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Leesa Gray: Mom to Witness Execution of Convicted Killer Who Raped, Strangled Her 16-year-old Daughter [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.crimeonline.com/2022/12/14/leesa-gray-mom-to-witness-execution-of-convicted-killer-who-raped-strangled-her-16-year-old-daughter/]
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Pedophile Execution Squad [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6506821/Grandfathertells-wore-Paedophile-Execution-Squad-T-shirt-court-Kmart-kidnap-accused.html]
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On this date, December 14, 2022, John Henry Ramirez was executed by lethal injection in Mississippi. He was convicted of the June 23, 2000 murder of 16-year-old Leesa Gray.
"If a man is a danger to the community, threatening it with disintegration by some wrongdoing of his, then his execution for the healing and preservation of the common good is to be commended. Only the public authority, not private persons, may licitly execute malefactors by public judgment. Men shall be sentenced to death for crimes of irreparable harm or which are particularly perverted." St. Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologica, 11; 65-2; 66-6. [PHOTO SOURCE: http://victimsfamiliesforthedeathpenalty.blogspot.com/2016/01/saint-thomas-aquinas-on-death-penalty.html]
Ex-marine death row inmate eats pork chops, peach cobbler and Pillsbury Grands biscuits for his final meal before he is executed by lethal injection for the rape and murder of 16-year-old girl in 2000
· Thomas Loden, 58, was covered by a white head sheet during his execution
· Before the injection started, Loden said he was 'deeply remorseful' for his crime
· He murdered Leesa Marie Gray, 16, in 2000 after she was stranded on a rural road with a flat tire
· On Wednesday night, her mother watched Loden's execution
· He is the second inmate killed by lethal injection in Mississippi in two years
A marine on death row for raping and murdering 16-year-old Leesa Marie Gray in 2000 ate pork chops and biscuits for his final meal before his execution.
Thomas Loden, 58, wore a red prison jumpsuit and was covered by a white head sheet during his execution as he beame the second inmate to be killed by lethal injection in Mississippi in two years.
His last meal was made up of two fried pork chops, fried okra, a baked sweet potato with butter, Pillsbury Grands biscuits with butter and molasses, peach cobbler with French vanilla ice cream and Lipton sweet tea, Fox News reported.
Loden had been condemned to die by lethal injection and spent the last 21 years in prison after pleading guilty for capital murder, on rape and four counts of sexual battery against teenager Leesa Marie Gray.
Wanda Farris, Gray's mother, attended the execution at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman, to watch her daughter's killer die. She said last week that she had forgiven Loden years ago but didn't believe his apology.
Farris said: 'I don't particularly want to see somebody die. But I do believe in the death penalty... I do believe in justice.'
Before the injection started, Loden said he was 'deeply remorseful' for his crime.
'For the past 20 years, I've tried to do a good deed every single day to make up for the life I took from this world,' Loden said. 'If today brings you nothing else, I hope you get peace and closure.'
He concluded his last words by saying 'I love you' in Japanese, officials said.
LORD PLEASE HANG EM HIGH! PROTECT OUR CHILDREN FROM THE SEXUAL PEDOPHILE! PURGE THE EVIL FROM THE LAND! GIVE THEM THREE DAYS TO LIVE! OR HAVE THE RULING AUTHORITIES BOOTED OUT OF OFFICE! Paperback – January 12, 2011 by (Author) [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.amazon.com/PLEASE-PROTECT-CHILDREN-PEDOPHILE-AUTHORITIES/dp/B00588BM8S]
Loden had been condemned to die by lethal injection at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman, ending up on death row in 2001.
He spent the last 21 years in prison after pleading guilty for capital murder, on rape and four counts of sexual battery against teenager Leesa Marie Gray.
During the summer ahead of what should have been Gray's senior year of high school, she had worked as a waitress at her uncle's restaurant in northeast Mississippi.
On June 22, 2000, she left work after dark and became stranded with a flat tire on a rural road.
Loden, a Marine Corps recruiter with relatives in the area, encountered Gray on the road around 10:45pm.
He stopped and began speaking with the teenager about the flat tire.
'Don't worry. I'm a Marine. We do this kind of stuff,' he said.
Loden told investigators he became angry after Gray allegedly said she would never want to be a Marine, and that he ordered her into his van.
He spent four hours sexually assaulting her before strangling and suffocating her, according to an interview he gave investigators.
Court records show that on the afternoon of June 23, 2000, 'Loden was discovered lying by the side of a road with the words "I'm sorry" carved into his chest and apparent self-inflicted lacerations on his wrists.'
After pleading guilty in September 2001, Loden told Gray's friends and family during his sentencing: 'I hope you may have some sense of justice when you leave here today.'
Lessa Marie Gray (July 11, 1983 to June 23, 2000) [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.facebook.com/photo/?fbid=10227728847063332&set=a.1541137885042]
Wanda Farris, Gray's mother, described her daughter as a 'happy-go-lucky, always smiling' teenager who aspired to become an elementary school teacher.
'She wasn't perfect, now, mind you,' Farris said. 'But she strived to do right.'
David Neal Cox Sr, Mississippi's last executed inmate, gave his lawyers instructions on where to find the remains of Felecia Cox, his estranged wife who disappeared in Pontotoc County in northern Mississippi.
Cox fatally shot Kim Kirk Cox, 40, while she was staying at a sister’s home in Union County, court records say.
As his estranged wife lay dying, he then repeatedly sexually assaulted his 12-year-old stepdaughter, said the authorities.
His execution was Mississippi’s first in nearly a decade.
In 2015, attorneys for the Roderick & Solange MacArthur Justice Center sued the Mississippi prison system on behalf of two death row inmates, saying the state's lethal injection protocol is inhumane.
Loden and two other Mississippi death row inmates later joined as plaintiffs.
The Mississippi Department of Corrections revealed in court papers in July 2021 that it had acquired three drugs for its lethal injection protocol: midazolam, which is a sedative; vecuronium bromide, which paralyzes the muscles; and potassium chloride, which stops the heart.
Jim Craig, a MacArthur Center attorney, said at a November court hearing that since 2019, only Alabama, Oklahoma, Mississippi and Tennessee have conducted executions using a three-drug protocol.
According to the Death Penalty Information Center, 27 states have the death penalty. Craig said a majority of death-penalty states and the federal government used a three-drug protocol in 2008, but the federal government and most of those states have since started using one drug.
In November, Alabama Gov. Kay Ivey sought a pause in executions and ordered a 'top-to-bottom' review of the state's capital punishment system after a series of failed lethal injections.
Jeworski Mallett, deputy commissioner of institutions for the Department of Corrections, told reporters that Mississippi has done 'mock executions and drills' on a monthly basis to avoid a botched execution.
There are 36 inmates on death row in Mississippi. The Department of Corrections has 'mock executions and drills' on a monthly basis to avoid a botched execution
A week before Loden's scheduled execution, US District Judge Henry Wingate handed down a ruling saying the execution could happen even while the lawsuit is pending.
He wrote that the US Supreme Court had upheld a three-drug lethal injection protocol as recently as seven years ago in a case from Oklahoma.
'Clearly, something in him snapped for him to commit such a horrific crime,' said Mitzi Magleby, a spokesperson for the Mississippi chapter of Ignite Justice, an organization that advocates for criminal justice reform.
'Mr. Loden was immediately remorseful. Shouldn't there be room for grace and mercy in such a situation?'
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11541453/Former-marine-eats-pork-chops-lethal-injection-rape-murder-16-year-old.html
Lessa Marie Gray (July 11, 1983 to June 23, 2000) [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/6279246/leesa-marie-gray]
Federal judge greenlights Mississippi execution
by Mina Corpuz December 8, 2022
Thomas Loden, convicted of rape and murder, is scheduled to be executed Dec. 14, 2022. Credit: MDOC
The scheduled execution of death row inmate Thomas Edwin Loden Jr. will be allowed to proceed, a federal judge ruled Wednesday.
U.S. District Court Judge Henry Wingate denied a stay for Loden as part of a lawsuit challenging Missisisppi’s lethal injection protocol. Loden’s execution is set for Dec. 14 at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at Parchman.
“Loden contends that since he is a plaintiff in this underlying lawsuit challenging Mississippi’s lethal injection mode of execution, the same procedure Mississippi intends to use to put him to death, he should not be executed before a decision on the constitutionality is rendered,” Wingate wrote.
“Loden, however, cannot convincingly argue that his involvement in this 1983 lawsuit has somehow expanded his rights and provided him a shield against execution,” he wrote, adding that granting a stay would likely delay Loden’s execution for years.
Wingate ruled in a civil lawsuit brought by death row inmates Richard Jordan and Ricky Chase against Mississippi Department of Corrections officials that Loden and others have joined.
In his order, Wingate scheduled a hearing for Jan. 19, 2023, about whether to issue an indefinite stay of execution for the plaintiffs and other intervenors in the case.
Lifespark lights a candle for 16 year old Leesa Marie Gray who was brutally murdered by Thomas Edwin Loden, Jr. on June 23, 2000. [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=637646294818966&set=a.578747064042223]
Stacy Ferraro, one of Loden’s attorneys, argued against the state’s October request to set Loden’s execution by citing the pending lawsuit and saying Loden had not yet exhausted his appeals, according to court documents.
Loden, 58, has been a death row inmate for over 20 years. In 2000, the military recruiter kidnapped, raped and killed 16-year-old Leesa Marie Gray in Dorsey in Itawamba County.
The lawsuit before Wingate argues that the state’s three-drug cocktail for lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment because the compounded or mixed drugs the state uses could be “counterfeit, expired, contaminated and/or sub-potent” and result in people being conscious during the execution, according to court documents.
Jim Craig of the MacArthur Center for Justice, who represents the plaintiffs Jordan and Chase, filed a temporary restraining order in October asking Wingate to withdraw the motion to set an execution date for Loden and not to execute him until the lawsuit is resolved.
The Attorney General’s Office has argued that a case challenging the execution process doesn’t prevent Loden’s execution from proceeding because it is not challenging his death sentence, just the method of execution, according to court documents.
In 2015, Wingate issued a preliminary injunction blocking the state from executing anyone using the three-drug combination, saying in a written order that the inmates were likely to successfully argue that “Mississippi’s failure to use a drug which qualifies as an ‘ultra short-acting barbiturate or other similar drug’ as required” by state law violates both that law and the U.S. Constitution’s due process guarantees. But the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overruled that decision less than a year later.
The court wrote that the federal court can’t force state officials to follow state law, and the plaintiffs weren’t able to show their due process rights were violated. This sent the case back to the district court.
The Mississippi Department of Corrections plans to put Loden to death by lethal injection.
Under a law that went into effect in July, prison officials can choose from four execution methods: lethal injection, electrocution, lethal gas and firing squad. Before Wingate’s ruling, department spokesman Leo Honeycutt confirmed lethal injection was the method Corrections Commissioner Burl Cain and two deputy commissioners selected.
In his order, Wingate mentioned the state could select another execution method, but that would “surely be attacked in a new lawsuit.”
That law updated a 2017 version that said if lethal injection was not possible due to a legal challenge or unavailability of drugs, an incarcerated person could be put to death by gas chamber. If that option wasn’t available, electrocution was the next available method followed by firing squad.
Lethal injection remains the state’s preferred form of execution, according to the legislation.
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=pfbid0PH29Q2UgZDmVbTzVzmFsGSQpXhLfrg7DCbLLkM7cTHJcfqtp5S58HEzpF3wPLNwAl&id=100066689583173
https://vk.com/wall-184585082_748
https://mississippitoday.org/2022/12/08/thomas-edwin-loden-execution/
Wanda Farris sits beside a picture of her daughter, 16-year-old Leesa Gray. Gray was kidnapped, raped and murdered by Loden in the summer of 2000 [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11541453/Former-marine-eats-pork-chops-lethal-injection-rape-murder-16-year-old.html]
'I forgave him a long time ago': Mother of Eddie Loden's victim shows strength, compassion in overcoming grief
William Moore, Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal, Tupelo
Sun, December 11, 2022 at 12:59 PM·5 min read
Dec. 10—DORSEY — Wanda Comer Farris forgave the man who raped and killed her daughter years ago.
Although she plans to go the Mississippi State Penitentiary next Wednesday to watch Thomas Edwin "Eddie" Loden be put to death by lethal injection, Farris said she long ago accepted her daughter's death and emptied her heart of whatever anger she felt toward her killer.
"I forgave him a long time ago," she said, adding that she supports the death penalty as punishment, but not for vindictiveness.
"You need to forgive to move on," she said. "You can't keep all that bitterness inside. I never hated the man. I just don't understand what makes some people tick."
In the summer of 2000, Leesa Marie Gray was a bubbly 16-year-old getting ready to start her senior year that fall at Itawamba Agricultural High School.
"She was always smiling and happy-go-lucky," Farris said of her daughter. "When the kids talked about her back then, they always mentioned her smile. She was a good Christian girl.
Farris said a reporter once told her they had never heard a bad word about Gray.
"That made me feel good, but it was nothing I did," she said. "I was not the most perfect mother."
Lessa Marie Gray (July 11, 1983 to June 23, 2000)
But even at 16, Gray already had maternal instincts. She was big into Big Brothers Big Sisters through the school. Farris said her daughter loved spending time with her "little sister." Gray had also started babysitting two little boys, which caused her to spend less time serving at Comer's, the family's Highway 178 restaurant in the Dorsey community.
In June 2000, Gray had the misfortune of waiting on Loden. The 35-year-old man became infatuated with her. He tried to flirt with the teen, then sabotaged her car and laid in wait for her as she headed home one night.
Even 22 years later, the night her daughter died, and the next morning, are still vivid in Farris' mind.
"The next day, I went outside and prayed, 'Lord if she is gone — and deep in my heart I knew she was gone — Lord help me to not be bitter and help us found her body,'" Farris said. "The way it worked out showed me God is in control."
Gray's body was located hours later.
Losing the well-liked teen devastated not only the community, but incensed the region.
Throngs of mourners packed the gymnasium at IAHS in Fulton for her funeral the following week.
Dealing with the loss of her daughter was tough on Farris.
"I was in shock. You never think anything like this will happen to you," Farris said. "And 22 years ago, you'd never think of this happening in a rural area like this.
"It was hard. I just laid on the bed one day and asked the Lord to stop my heart from beating. Then the phone rang, it was my son asking what I was doing. So I got up."
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"I would've lost the image of being the picture-perfect Marine"
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Farris said her faith — along with her church, family and friends — got her through the tumultuous time. She also credited Survival Incorporated, a victim support group started by Carolyn Clayton after her daughter was killed while jogging in Tupelo.
Gray's family was spared the pain of having to endure a potentially lengthy trial when Loden pleaded guilty to Gray's murder in September 2001. Before being sentenced to death, he stood up in court and apologized for his actions.
But his words rang hollow with his victim's family.
"He stood up in court and told us he was sorry and how he would never do anything to hurt us again," Farris said. "The one comfort I did have was that he was locked up and not getting out. I didn't have to worry about him doing the same thing with other little girls."
Still, that was cold comfort to a grieving mother, and Farris held onto her anger toward her daughter's killer for another year before forgiving him and letting go of that pain.
"I was going through the grieving process. I was just home one day thinking about all the stuff and it just came to me. I said out loud, 'I forgive you Eddie Loden,'" Farris said. "The Lord listened, and I wasn't bitter. Forgiveness helps you move on.
Although Farris said letting go of her anger was a relief, it brought with it a sense of guilt.
"I felt like I was betraying Leesa," she said. She had to call her preacher to get his reassurances that forgiving Loden was not a disservice to her daughter.
Even after forgiving Loden, she still clung tightly to her daughter. It took another couple of years before faith let her let go.
"I was in my own little world for four years. I finally said I've got to let her go," Farris said. "I thank the Lord I had her for 16 years. I wish it could have been more, but I know she is in a better place in heaven."
Although she's never seen someone die, Farris plans to witness Loden's execution next Wednesday. She will ride to Sunflower County with an Itawamba County constable. At the state penitentiary, she will be surrounded by not only her family and friends but also her daughter's best friend since kindergarten.
State law only allows two members of the victim's family to witness the execution. Farris will be one; the other will come from her father's side of the family. John Gray died in 2010, still waiting for justice for his daughter.
For Farris, Loden's death represents the end of a long, painful journey, and a new beginning of sorts.
"I am doing it for my daughter," she said. "There will be some relief that this is not hanging over our head anymore."
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.yahoo.com/news/forgave-him-long-time-ago-045900826.html
https://vk.com/wall-184585082_746
Leesa Gray: Mom to Witness Execution of Convicted Killer Who Raped, Strangled Her 16-year-old Daughter [PHOTO SOURCE: https://www.crimeonline.com/2022/12/14/leesa-gray-mom-to-witness-execution-of-convicted-killer-who-raped-strangled-her-16-year-old-daughter/]
“I don’t particularly want to see somebody die,” Leesa’s mother, Wanda Farris, told AP. “But I do believe in the death penalty … I do believe in justice.”
“She loved life and she was a good Christian girl….She wasn’t perfect, now, mind you, but she strived to do right.”
The execution is scheduled to take place at the Mississippi State Penitentiary at 6 p.m. Check back for updates.
INTERNET SOURCE: https://www.crimeonline.com/2022/12/14/leesa-gray-mom-to-witness-execution-of-convicted-killer-who-raped-strangled-her-16-year-old-daughter/
If the criminal taking of a human life does not merit forfeiture of one's own life, then what value have we placed on the life taken? - Pat Buchanan [PHOTO SOURCE: https://quozio.com/quote/5hvg8xggccvn/1318/if-the-criminal-taking-of-a-human-life-does-not-merit] Article: http://victimsfamiliesforthedeathpenalty.blogspot.com/2015/11/scalia-v-pope-whos-right-on-death.html
RELATED LINKS:
Rev Jeff Hood =
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Woke Leader of Christian Org. Wants to Abolish Criminal Punishment, Even For Cannibals and Rapists
https://www.facebook.com/groups/3350621811720081/posts/5467842389998002/
Repent Or Perish says:
October 5, 2022 at 11:49 am
The fact these individuals proclaim themselves ‘evangelists’ is perverted and sick. Their desire to free the brutal predators in our society from punishment is akin to declaring violence on those they should be trying to protect.
https://christiansforabolition.org/
https://relevantmagazine.com/faith/church/op-ed-a-christian-case-for-prison-abolition/
https://gereformeerd.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/04/Magdeburg-Confession-1550.pdf
Bring back public execution by firing squads By Tony Fagbemi
https://vk.com/wall-184585082_688
https://guardian.ng/opinion/bring-back-public-execution-by-firing-squads/
OTHER LINKS:
See also
- List of people executed in the United States in 2022
- List of people executed in Texas, 2020–present
- List of people executed in Oklahoma