Va. inmate who killed 2 executed by electric chair

Story Summary

A former Army counterintelligence worker was executed by electric chair Tuesday for killing a Virginia couple, becoming the first U.S. inmate to die by electrocution in over a year.

Larry Bill Elliott was pronounced dead at 9:08 p.m. at Greensville Correctional Center in Jarratt. He was convicted of the January 2001 shooting deaths of 25-year-old Dana Thrall and 30-year-old Robert Finch.

Prosecutors said Elliott killed the couple to win the love of former stripper and escort Rebecca Gragg, who was involved in a bitter custody dispute with the man who was killed.

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Two separate juries convicted Elliott of the killings. A 2002 verdict was set aside because a juror discussed the case outside of the court. He was convicted again a year later.

Finch was shot three times, and Thrall was beaten before being shot several times in the face and chest while her two boys, ages 4 and 6, were upstairs in the couple's Woodbridge town home.

At 60, Elliott was Virginia's oldest death row inmate. Virginia death row inmates can choose between the electric chair and lethal injection.

Of the 35 death penalty states, seven Southern states still offer electrocution. Two others allow it only if lethal injection is deemed unconstitutional.

The last person executed by electrocution in the U.S. was James Earl Reed, who put to death in South Carolina in June 2008 for killing his ex-girlfriend's parents. Virginia's last electrocution was in 2006.

Goodbye scum.

He actually chose electrocution? I don't argue that he didn't deserve his ending but why would anyone choose electrocution if they had lethal injection as an alternative? I mean that has got to be the most painful way to go in the U.S. as far as means of execution. With lethal injection if it's done right there is supposed to be very little (if any) pain I understand. You just go to sleep from the 1st shot and the 2nd and 3rd shots stop your lungs and heart from working.

Had a guy here a few years back that chose to be hanged instead of lethal injection. I often wonder if these guys go for something other than lethal in the hopes that the state won't carry out an execution unless it is lethal injection.

Oh well........hopes springs eternal.