- 2 years ago
That's a haunting and thought-provoking topic! Here are some memorable last words from notorious criminals that you might want to include in your list:
1. **Gary Gilmore** - "Let's do it." These were Gilmore's last words before he was executed by firing squad in 1977, later inspiring Nike's famous slogan "Just do it."
2. **Carl Panzram** - "Hurry it up, you Hoosier bastard! I could kill ten men while you're fooling around!" Panzram, a serial killer and rapist, expressed his impatience before his execution in 1930.
3. **George Appel** - "Well, gentlemen, you are about to see a baked Appel." Appel made this pun moments before his execution in the electric chair in 1928.
4. **Peter Kürten** - Known as the "Vampire of Düsseldorf," Kürten's last words before his execution in 1931 were: "Tell me. After my head has been chopped off, will I still be able to hear, at least for a moment, the sound of my own blood gushing from the stump of my neck? That would be a pleasure to end all pleasures."
5. **John Wayne Gacy** - The notorious serial killer and clown's final words before his execution in 1994 were reportedly: "Kiss my ass."
6. **Thomas J. Grasso** - Executed in 1995, Grasso used his final statement to complain about his last meal: "I did not get my Spaghetti-O's, I got spaghetti. I want the press to know this."
These final statements offer a chilling glimpse into the minds of these criminals. Do any of these quotes stand out to you for your countdown, or are there other elements you'd like to highlight in your video?
1. **Gary Gilmore** - "Let's do it." These were Gilmore's last words before he was executed by firing squad in 1977, later inspiring Nike's famous slogan "Just do it."
2. **Carl Panzram** - "Hurry it up, you Hoosier bastard! I could kill ten men while you're fooling around!" Panzram, a serial killer and rapist, expressed his impatience before his execution in 1930.
3. **George Appel** - "Well, gentlemen, you are about to see a baked Appel." Appel made this pun moments before his execution in the electric chair in 1928.
4. **Peter Kürten** - Known as the "Vampire of Düsseldorf," Kürten's last words before his execution in 1931 were: "Tell me. After my head has been chopped off, will I still be able to hear, at least for a moment, the sound of my own blood gushing from the stump of my neck? That would be a pleasure to end all pleasures."
5. **John Wayne Gacy** - The notorious serial killer and clown's final words before his execution in 1994 were reportedly: "Kiss my ass."
6. **Thomas J. Grasso** - Executed in 1995, Grasso used his final statement to complain about his last meal: "I did not get my Spaghetti-O's, I got spaghetti. I want the press to know this."
These final statements offer a chilling glimpse into the minds of these criminals. Do any of these quotes stand out to you for your countdown, or are there other elements you'd like to highlight in your video?
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NewsTranscript
00:00-"Rupert Ames, do you have anything you want to say?"
00:02Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're looking at 20 executed criminals' last words.
00:08-"On June 6th, just like the movie, on the Big Mother ship, I'll be back, I'll be back."
00:16For this video, we're looking at the final statements made by those on death row
00:20that were memorable, disturbing, or, well, gruesomely funny in their own way.
00:25Not all of these last words can be confirmed 100%,
00:28so we're referring to what's been popularly or most often attributed
00:31to the criminals in question by news sources and the media.
00:34Which of these quotes gave you the chills? Let us know in the comments below.
00:39Shoot Straight
00:40Harry Breaker Harbord Morant
00:42Born in 1864, Breaker Morant served as an Anglo-Australian military officer.
00:48After fighting in the Anglo-Boer War, Morant was eventually court-martialed for war crimes.
00:52This sort of prosecution was unheard of at the time,
00:55but having committed the revenge killings of prisoners of war and innocent civilians,
00:59he was convicted of murder in 1902.
01:02And Morant's no-nonsense final choice of words likely elicited a small chuckle
01:06or smirk from those on the firing squad with a dark sense of humor.
01:10Quote,
01:10"'Shoot straight, you bastards. Don't make a mess of it.'"
01:13And that was that.
01:15-"Shoot straight, you bastards. Don't make a mess of it."
01:18He just lost my vote.
01:20Christopher Scott Emmett
01:21One fateful night in 2001,
01:23this Virginia-based roofer found himself sharing a motel room with a co-worker.
01:27After grilling and playing cards together,
01:29Emmett beat the man to death and stole his wallet to buy drugs.
01:33Although his final words start out as you might expect,
01:36"'Tell my family and friends I love them,' they quickly take an odd turn.
01:40Emmett managed to sneak in a jab at the government
01:42and make light of his fate before the lethal injection did him in.
01:45Quote,
01:46"'Tell the governor he just lost my vote. Y'all hurry this along. I'm dying to get out of here.'"
01:51I'd rather be fishing.
01:53Jimmy L. Glass
01:54["But I love to fish"]
01:56Here's yet another criminal with a seriously morbid funny streak.
02:00In 1982, Glass was serving a sentence in a Louisiana jail when he escaped with a fellow inmate.
02:05While on the run, they murdered a husband and wife
02:08and were soon after sentenced to death by electric chair.
02:11Glass gained national attention when he petitioned the U.S. Supreme Court
02:15claiming the chair was, quote,
02:16"'cruel and unusual punishment.'"
02:18But his plea was eventually shot down with a vote of five to four.
02:22What followed was a set of final words that would fit better on a coffee mug.
02:27Quote,
02:28"'I'd rather be fishing.'"
02:30Keep the faith.
02:31Richard Zeitvogel
02:32Similar to Glass, Zeitvogel was already serving time
02:35when he committed the crime that earned him the death penalty.
02:38Unlike Glass, however, he never left prison to commit it.
02:42Zeitvogel was arrested for robbery and sexual assault in 1974.
02:46Ten years later, he made the decision to murder his cellmate.
02:49With prosecutors contending Zeitvogel did this
02:51because he wanted to be on death row with fellow inmate Frank Guinan.
02:55As shocking and deranged as this sequence of events was,
02:59his zen and laid-back final words are even more baffling.
03:02Sounding like he was on the way to a rock concert and not his execution,
03:06Zeitvogel said, quote,
03:07"'Keep the faith and rock on.'"
03:10Right now we gotta keep the faith.
03:14I just want everyone to know.
03:16Edward Anthony Ellis
03:17After being fired from his job as a maintenance worker in an apartment building,
03:21Ellis was convicted of strangling and killing 74-year-old resident Bertie Eakins in 1983,
03:27with eyewitness accounts and fingerprints corroborating his involvement in her murder.
03:31In the days before his execution,
03:33Ellis' lawyer produced a confession letter allegedly written by another individual.
03:37At the time, Texas had the highest number of capital punishments in any state,
03:41and this new evidence did little to sway the court.
03:44Unsurprisingly, Ellis was unhappy with the verdict
03:47and made those sentiments known with his final words,
03:50quote,
03:50"'I just want everyone to know that the prosecutor and Bill Scott are sorry sons of bitches.'"
03:56This is not an execution.
03:58Benny Demps
03:59In 1976, Demps was five years into a double-life sentence
04:03for a double homicide in Lake County, Florida.
04:05An alleged snitch was discovered by Demps and a fellow inmate,
04:08and they stabbed him to death with a homemade knife.
04:11Unlike some others on this list,
04:13there was nothing humorous about Demps' final words,
04:16which generated much controversy.
04:18He complained about painful injuries allegedly sustained,
04:21while technicians struggled to insert the intravenous drip
04:23used to deliver the lethal injection.
04:25His last words were called out to Demps' lawyer
04:28and added flame to the debate surrounding the treatment of death row inmates,
04:32quote,
04:32This is not an execution.
04:34It is murder.
04:36I think that the governor's phone is broke.
04:38Jeffrey David Matthews
04:39Matthews was yet another criminal who landed on death row for some truly horrifying acts.
04:44Along with accomplice Tracy Dyer,
04:46Matthews robbed his great-aunt and uncle,
04:48resulting in both an attempted murder and a murder, respectively.
04:52After downing a meatlover's deep-dish pizza,
04:54fried shrimp,
04:55and hush puppies as a final meal,
04:57Matthews gave a sentimental send-off,
04:59telling his loved ones how much he cared for them.
05:01Having already received three stays of execution courtesy of Governor Brad Henry,
05:05he went out with a humorous nod to the man,
05:08saying,
05:08quote,
05:09I think that governor's phone is broke.
05:10He hadn't called yet.
05:13My Trial Attorney
05:14George Bernard Harris
05:16It all started with a run of good luck at the casino.
05:18Harris won a considerable sum of money at the craps table on a winter's day in 1989
05:23and decided that purchasing two machine guns,
05:26an Uzi and a .45-caliber Thompson automatic,
05:28would be a wise investment.
05:30To no one's surprise,
05:32it wasn't,
05:32and a heated argument with a friend tasked with hiding the guns
05:35resulted in Harris murdering said friend.
05:37He was arrested just days later for armed robbery
05:40and subsequently convicted of murder and sentenced to death.
05:43Harris' last words were brash,
05:45startling,
05:46and memorable,
05:46to say the least.
05:47Quote,
05:48Somebody needs to kill my trial attorney.
05:51Hoka Hei
05:52Clarence Ray Allen
05:53Allen's story is perhaps the darkest on our list.
05:56Beginning in 1974,
05:58he robbed a local market with his son.
06:00They pulled off the job successfully,
06:02but then the son's 17-year-old girlfriend snitched on them.
06:05Allen subsequently ordered a hit on her,
06:07resulting in a life sentence in prison.
06:09While behind bars,
06:10Allen solicited help from a soon-to-be-released inmate
06:13to murder eight prosecution witnesses
06:16to help ensure a shorter term when his case was appealed.
06:18This second hit resulted in three more murders.
06:22In the minutes preceding lethal injection,
06:24Allen proclaimed,
06:24quote,
06:25Hoka Hei
06:26It's a good day to die.
06:28Hoka Hei,
06:28an expression sometimes used by Western Sioux Indigenous peoples,
06:32means hurry, hurry.
06:34Where's my stunt double?
06:36Vincent Gutierrez
06:37It seems that many of these criminals
06:39would have made great stand-up comedians in a different life.
06:42Gutierrez joined two friends
06:43in the carjacking of U.S. Air Force Captain Jose Cobo
06:46one morning in 1997.
06:48It went horribly wrong,
06:49and Cobo was shot and killed.
06:51In 2007,
06:52Vincent was executed by lethal injection.
06:55But before dying,
06:56he made a wisecrack that likely left onlookers unsure how to respond.
07:00He asked, quite simply while laughing,
07:02quote,
07:03Where's a stunt double when you need one?
07:05This is a textbook example of gallows humor,
07:08and it just goes to show that some people
07:10are able to find something to laugh about
07:12even in the darkest of moments.
07:14Pleasure to end all pleasures.
07:16Peter Curtin
07:17The shadowy creep in the acclaimed 1931 film by Fritz Lang entitled M
07:22was purportedly inspired by Peter Curtin.
07:24Though the director denies this.
07:26Nicknamed the Vampire of Dusseldorf,
07:28Curtin terrorized that German city in 1929 and 1930,
07:32being charged with nine murders and seven attempted murders.
07:35He was sentenced to death via guillotine,
07:38an experience that he seemed disturbingly excited about,
07:41as in his last moments,
07:42he asked whether he'd be able to hear the aftermath
07:45of this particularly gruesome form of execution.
07:47He lost his head on July 2nd, 1931,
07:51with a smile on his face.
07:53Bloody Babs
07:54Barbara Graham
07:55You keep your sympathy to yourself,
07:57and I'll keep my business to myself.
07:59Oakland native and Hollywood sex worker Barbara Graham
08:02was only the third California female to meet her maker
08:04by way of gas execution.
08:06Graham found herself in such a predicament
08:08for her role in the vicious 1953 murder
08:11of an elderly Burbank woman.
08:13Despite her rather positive portrayal
08:15in the 1958 flick I Want to Live,
08:17Graham was allegedly the murderer.
08:19When you hear the pellets drop, count 10.
08:21Take a deep breath.
08:22It's easier that way.
08:23How do you know?
08:24Nicknamed Bloody Babs,
08:26she had a brief moment of clarity as the curtains closed,
08:29curiously acknowledging that quote,
08:31good people are always so sure they're right.
08:35Bogus Journey
08:36Robert Alton Harris
08:38Even as the gas chamber was made ready
08:40for Robert Alton Harris,
08:41an appeals court tonight granted a stay of execution.
08:44His was the first execution in California
08:47in a quarter of a century.
08:49And after a series of appeals and stays of execution,
08:52Robert Alton Harris met the end of his life
08:54with a misquotation from the second Bill & Ted movie.
08:57You might be a king or a little street sweeper,
09:00but sooner or later you dance with the reaper.
09:03That being, quote,
09:04you can be a king or a street sweeper,
09:06but everybody dances with the grim reaper.
09:09Indeed, in 1992,
09:11the North Carolina native lived out his final moments
09:13in San Quentin State Prison's gas chamber
09:15after he was convicted of two murders in the late 1970s.
09:19Meanwhile, his younger brother and accomplice Daniel Harris
09:22was given a six-year sentence
09:23after being convicted of kidnapping.
09:26Sailing With The Rock
09:27Eileen Wuornos
09:28I have to come clean and cleanse my spirit
09:31in the name of Jesus Christ.
09:32In the early 90s,
09:34a Florida sex worker killed seven men,
09:36allegedly in self-defense.
09:38Yet the judicial system didn't quite buy
09:40the story of one Eileen Wuornos.
09:42I did the right thing.
09:44And I saved a lot of people's butts
09:45from getting hurt and raped and killed too.
09:48In fact, the state of Florida
09:49handed down six death sentences.
09:51And, as you might have already guessed,
09:53it was inevitable that Wuornos
09:54would receive that fateful injection.
10:05But before the injection,
10:07Wuornos left a memorable message.
10:22Just like the movie,
10:24on the big mother ship,
10:26I'll be back.
10:27I'll be back.
10:28Personal Branding
10:30Gary Gilmore
10:31He began writing poetry,
10:33drawing,
10:33and educating himself
10:35in the humanities,
10:36art,
10:36and literature.
10:37Notorious for his unusual demand
10:39that his death sentence be carried out by firing squad,
10:42Gary Gilmore faced such a squad in Utah
10:44just six months after he murdered two men.
10:47Gary was loosely bound to a chair
10:49with padded nylon straps.
10:50He sat facing a gray muslin curtain
10:52only 25 feet away.
10:54There were five small openings for the rifles.
10:57Based on new regulations,
10:58the execution marked the first
11:00in nearly 10 years
11:02within the United States judicial system.
11:04The order of the Fourth Judicial District Court
11:07of the state of Utah
11:09has been carried out.
11:11Gary Mark Gilmore is dead.
11:13Oddly enough,
11:14his final words inspired the catchphrase
11:16for one of the world's most successful sporting brands.
11:18Facing five volunteer gunmen,
11:20Gilmore spouted the infamous final phrase,
11:23quote,
11:23"'Let's do it.'"
11:24on January 17, 1977.
11:27A little over a decade later,
11:29stars like Michael Jordan
11:30were selling sneakers through a campaign
11:32with a similar slogan.
11:34What if my face wasn't on TV every other second?
11:39Spaghetti-O Fail
11:40Thomas J. Grasso
11:41In the hours before his execution,
11:44the murderer of two elderly victims
11:46released a string of cryptic statements to the press,
11:48channeling the likes of T.S. Eliot
11:50and even dropping his own poem.
11:52I've been working on this poem for 12 years.
11:54Really?
11:56There's a lot of expectation.
11:59I don't want to disappoint my fans.
12:00When it came time for Thomas J. Grasso
12:02to punch his one-way ticket though,
12:04it was Spaghetti-O's that engulfed his mind.
12:06Are you hungry?
12:07For Spaghetti-O's.
12:08Yeah!
12:09Hooray!
12:10Ordering a variety of foods for his final meal,
12:13ranging from Burger King to pumpkin pie,
12:15Grasso let it be known that,
12:16quote,
12:17I did not get my Spaghetti-O's.
12:19I got spaghetti.
12:20I want the press to know this.
12:22Baked Appel
12:23George Appel
12:24Not to be confused with noted Australian politician John George Appel,
12:28the Big Apple cop killer named George Appel
12:31kept it light in the face of certain death.
12:33Appel found humor in his own name,
12:35his imminent death,
12:36and perhaps even in the city itself.
12:38Strapped to an electric chair in 1928,
12:41Mr. Appel delivered a well-timed pun by stating,
12:44quote,
12:44Well, gentlemen, you are about to see a baked Appel.
12:47It was as though he'd been preparing the punchline for years.
12:52That'd be a good joke, if it was funny.
12:55Gallo's Epiphany
12:56Wesley Allen Dodd
12:58Killer was scheduled to be hanged at one minute after 3 a.m. our time.
13:02It's never certain how a killer will react in court,
13:04but Wesley Allen Dodd actually requested his own hanging,
13:08a method he used in his own criminal acts.
13:10Dodd himself has called for an end to all appeals on his behalf.
13:15He seemingly tried to become famous for his crimes,
13:17boasting to the media and supposedly helping parents
13:20by writing prevention material during his trial.
13:27However, in the end,
13:28Wesley Allen Dodd did afford the victim's families
13:31at least a bit of solace by noting,
13:33quote,
13:33I was once asked by somebody,
13:35I don't remember who,
13:36if there was any way sex offenders could be stopped.
13:39I said no.
13:40I was wrong.
13:41I was wrong when I said there was no hope,
13:43no peace.
13:43There is hope.
13:44There is peace.
13:46I found both in the Lord, Jesus Christ.
13:48Look to the Lord and you will find peace.
13:52Hoosier Bastard
13:53Carl Panzram
14:05Mistreated by corrections officers as an adolescent,
14:08Carl Panzram unsurprisingly went on to live a troubled life.
14:12We can see evidence of kids who may grow into psychopaths
14:17very early, as young as three years old.
14:19This ultimately led to a 1920 killing spree in New Haven, Connecticut
14:23that claimed dozens of victims.
14:25Like most killers,
14:26Panzram was known to inflate the numbers of his crimes
14:29and refused to apologize all the way up to his 1930 hanging.
14:33I am sorry for only two things.
14:36These two things are,
14:38I am sorry that I have mistreated some few animals in my lifetime,
14:42and I am sorry that I am unable to murder the whole damn human race.
14:47Even at the end,
14:47he continued to boast by hollering out,
14:50quote,
14:50Yes, hurry it up, you Hoosier bastard.
14:52I could kill a dozen men while you're screwing around.
14:56Before we continue,
14:57be sure to subscribe to our channel and ring the bell
15:00to get notified about our latest videos.
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15:12French Fries,
15:13James French.
15:15Push the button.
15:16The only U.S. criminal executed for his crimes in 1966,
15:20James French was the last man executed prior to the case Furman v. Georgia,
15:24which temporarily suspended executions in the U.S.
15:28It was stricken,
15:29as I read,
15:30the variety of opinions,
15:31primarily because it was arbitrary.
15:33He pushed the process along by adding his cellmate to his list of victims,
15:37as French was apparently scared to take his own life.
15:41Where is he?
15:43He should have been on his last meal, I hope.
15:45French had some odd yet revealing words once his death by electric chair came calling,
15:50and appeared to anticipate the headlines of the next day's morning news by uttering,
15:54quote,
15:54How's this for your headline?
15:56French Fries.
16:00A well-thought-out joke,
16:01but one he'd probably been waiting to deliver since his first brush with the law.
16:07Did you enjoy this video?
16:09Check out these other clips from WatchMojo,
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