A man who threw a woman to her death off a Mississippi River bridge after stealing her car was executed by the state of Missouri on Wednesday.
Stanley Hall, 37, was pronounced dead at 12:06 CST (1:06 a.m. ET) following an injection of lethal chemicals at the Potosi Correctional Center, a spokesman said.
It was the 12th execution in the United States this year and the 956th since the country brought back capital punishment in 1976.
Hall was convicted of the January 1994 killing of Barbara Jo Wood, 44, who he kidnapped at gunpoint in a shopping mall parking lot as she arrived for work. Hall and an accomplice went to the mall to steal a car to use in a planned revenge attack on a rival.
Wood had been wounded and was struggling when Hall lifted her over the railing of the McKinley Bridge and dropped her into the river’s freezing waters. Her body was recovered downstream seven months later.
The courts rejected Hall’s final appeals that he was ineligible for the death penalty because he was mentally retarded based on 30-year-old intelligence test scores. More recent tests showed he scored above the threshold, prosecutors said.
His last meal consisted of a T-bone steak, shrimps, french fries, a milkshake and a salad with ranch dressing.
His final words were in the form of a written statement that read: “My statement to the Wood family is to let them know how truly and sincerely sorry I am for being involved with what I was and I’d like them to know that I’m sorry. Signed, sincerely sorry, Stanley Hall.”
