PARCHMAN, Miss. (AP) — A Mississippi man convicted of kidnapping, raping and killing a 20-year-old community college student in 1993 was executed Wednesday.
Charles Crawford, 59, was pronounced dead at 6:15 p.m. by lethal injection at the Mississippi State Penitentiary in Parchman.
Crawford spent more than 30 years on death row. His execution came months after the execution of Mississippi's longest-serving death row inmate in a year of increasing executions nationwide.
Crawford was convicted of kidnapping Christy Ray from her parents' home in Tippah County in northern Mississippi on January 29, 1993. According to court records, when Ray's mother returned home, her daughter's car was gone and a handwritten ransom note was left on the table.
That same day, another ransom note, made from magazine clippings and relating to a woman named Jennifer, was found in the attic of Crawford's former father-in-law. The note was passed on to law enforcement, who began searching for Crawford. A day later he was arrested and told that he was returning from hunting.
He later told authorities that he lost consciousness and did not remember killing Ray.
At the time of his arrest, Crawford was days away from trial on a separate assault charge. The trial began after a 1991 attack in which Crawford was accused of raping a 17-year-old girl and hitting her friend with a hammer.
Despite his claims that he blacked out and did not remember either the rape or the hammer attack, Crawford was found guilty of both charges in two separate trials.
His previous rape conviction was considered an “aggravating factor” by the jury in Crawford's case, paving the way for his death sentence.
Given the chance to make his final statement, Crawford said, “To my family: I love you. I am at peace. I have God's peace,” and added, “I will be in heaven.”
He also addressed Ray's family, saying, “To the victim's family: true closure and true peace, you can't achieve this without God.”
Over the past three decades, Crawford has unsuccessfully tried to overturn his death sentence.
In an order issued minutes before the execution was scheduled, the U.S. Supreme Court refused to stop the execution without explanation. Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote the dissent, joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson.
His lawyers appealed to the Supreme Court, arguing that Crawford should get a new trial because his Sixth Amendment rights were violated in the 1994 trial.
The appeal argued that Crawford's lawyers admitted his guilt in his capital murder trial and asserted an insanity defense over Crawford's repeated objections. The argument stems from a 2018 Supreme Court ruling that ordered a new trial for a death row inmate and found that a criminal defendant's lawyer cannot ignore a client's desire to maintain his innocence at trial.
“It appears he didn't even have the opportunity to prove innocence or guilt because his lawyer simply overrode his wishes from the beginning,” said Chrissy Nobile, director of the Mississippi Office of Conviction Assistance, which represented Crawford.
The Mississippi Supreme Court rejected that argument in September, writing that Crawford should have appealed sooner and failing to provide adequate reasons for why the Supreme Court's 2018 decision should be applied retroactively.
After the Mississippi Supreme Court set the execution date in September, Nobile said Crawford expressed both disappointment and determination.
Nobile described Crawford as a respected and inspiring man on death row. She said he worked at the prison and advocated for other inmates.
Mark McClure, chief superintendent of the Mississippi Department of Corrections, said during a news conference Crawford attended with his family and preacher Wednesday afternoon.
The Associated Press repeatedly tried to contact Ray's relatives but received no response. Crawford also did not respond to requests for comment.
The lethal injection was the third in two days in the United States, following executions on Tuesday in Florida and Missouri. This year, a total of 38 people have been executed by court order in the United States.
In Florida, 72-year-old Samuel Lee Smithers was executed for the 1996 murders of two women whose bodies were found in a rural pond. In Missouri, Lance Shockley was executed for fatally shooting a state trooper in 2005.
Six more executions are scheduled for 2025, the next being that of Richard Djerf, who was convicted of killing four family members in Arizona more than 30 years ago.
