arizona death row | My Crime Library

Murray Hooper Execution Scheduled For Today

Murray Hooper is scheduled to be executed by the State of Arizona for the murders of two people during a robbery. According to court documents Murray Hooper and two other men forced their way into a home and would shoot and kill William “Pat” Redmond and his mother-in-law, Helen Phelps as well as shooting a third person. Murray Hooper would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. Murray Hooper lawyers are attempting to get his execution stayed claiming that the surviving witness failed to identify him in a photo lineup. The two other men convicted with Murray Hooper, William Bracy and Edward McCall, would die on death row before their executions could be carried out.

Murray Hooper More News

An Arizona prisoner scheduled to be executed Wednesday in the 1980 killings of two people asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review his claim that authorities had until recently withheld that a survivor had failed to identify him in a photo lineup.

Lawyers for Murray Hooper, who was convicted of killing William “Pat” Redmond and his mother-in-law, Helen Phelps, say the existence of the photo lineup wasn’t disclosed until this month.

A prosecutor told the state’s clemency board that Redmond’s wife, Marilyn, who survived being shot in the head, had been unable to identify Hooper as the attacker when she was shown a photo lineup. However, authorities now insist no such lineup was shown to Marilyn Redmond and that the claim is based on a mistake a prosecutor made in a letter to the board.

Marilyn Redmond eventually identified Hooper in an in-person lineup.

Hooper’s arguments have already been rejected twice this week by state courts, with the Arizona Supreme Court concluding Monday that the claim focusing on a photo lineup “has no evidentiary support and no basis in fact.”

Hooper’s attorneys keep pressing the matter. “The prosecutor’s belated admission flatly contradicts the state’s pretrial and trial assertions that no such (photo) lineup had ever been admninistered,” Hooper’s lawyers told the U.S. Supreme Court.

Hooper asked the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals to postpone his execution as he appeals a ruling that rejected his bid to allow fingerprint and DNA testing on evidence from the killings. On Tuesday evening, the appeals court concluded a lower-court judge lacked jurisdiction over Hooper’s lawsuit seeking testing and ordered that the case be dismissed.

His lawyers said Hooper is innocent, that no physical evidence ties him to the killings and that testing could lead to identifying those responsible. They say Hooper was convicted before computerized fingerprint systems and DNA testing were available in criminal cases.

Authorities say Hooper and two other men forced their way into the Redmond home on Dec. 31, 1980. The three victims were bound, gagged, robbed and shot in the head. Marilyn Redmond testified against Hooper at his trial.

Two other men, William Bracy and Edward McCall, were convicted in the killings but died before their death sentences could be carried out.

Authorities say Robert Cruz, who was alleged to have had ties to organized crime, hired Hooper, Bracy and McCall to kill Pat Redmond, who co-owned a printing business. They said Cruz wanted to take over the business and was unhappy that Redmond had rejected his offers to enter several printing contracts with Las Vegas hotels, according to court records. In 1995, Cruz was acquitted of murder charges in both deaths.

Hooper’s lawyers say Marilyn Redmond’s description of the assailants changed several times before she identified their client, who said he was not in Arizona at the time. They also raised questions about the benefits received by witnesses who testified against Hooper, including favorable treatment in other criminal cases.

Hooper would be the state’s third prisoner put to death this year after Arizona resumed carrying out executions in May, following a nearly eight-year hiatus attributed to both the difficulty of obtaining lethal injection drugs and criticism that a 2014 execution was botched.

Arizona has 111 people on death row, 22 of whom have exhausted their appeals, according to the state attorney general’s office.

https://apnews.com/article/us-supreme-court-arizona-executions-7950302aecde9d17770a1bc4ccc18e89

Murray Hooper Execution

An Arizona man convicted of murdering two people in 1980 was put to death Wednesday in the state’s third execution since officials started carrying out the death penalty in May after a nearly eight-year hiatus.

Murray Hooper, 76, died by lethal injection at the state prison in Florence for his murder convictions in the killings of William “Pat” Redmond and his mother-in-law, Helen Phelps, at Redmond’s home in Phoenix. Redmond’s wife, Marilyn, also was shot in the head during the attack but survived and testified against Hooper at his trial.

Authorities say the killings were carried out at the behest of a man who wanted to take over Redmond’s printing business.

Hooper’s death was announced by Frank Strada, a deputy director of the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry.

Hooper chuckled several times when interacting with the execution team. After the execution warrant was read aloud, Hooper said, “It’s all been said. Let it be done.”

It took about 20 minutes from the time the execution team members walked into the room until they inserted IV lines in his right leg and right forearm to administer a lethal dose of the sedative pentobarbital. There had been one earlier unsuccessful attempt to insert a line in his right arm. The IV in his leg was inserted through his femoral artery.

Once injected, his fingers quivered, and he yawned. After that, he made no movement. About 15 minutes passed between when a warden said let the execution begin and when Hooper was pronounced dead.

At one point while trying to insert the IV lines, a medical professional in the room couldn’t find a syringe with the anesthetic used to numb the area, so one was brought in and ultimately used on Hooper.

“It will hurt less,” the medical professional said. Hooper said, “OK, all right.” He later said, “I can’t believe this” and shook his head.

Arizona did not carry out the death penalty for nearly eight years after criticism that a 2014 execution was botched and because it encountered difficulty obtaining lethal injection drugs. No other executions are currently scheduled in the state.

rizona now has 110 people on death row.

Hooper was executed within a couple hours of the U.S. Supreme Court rejecting a last-minute appeal from him over his claim that authorities had until recently withheld that Marilyn Redmond had failed to identify him in a photo lineup. The high court made no comment in rejecting his appeal.

Authorities said that claim was based on a mistake a prosecutor made in a letter to the state’s clemency board and now insist that no such lineup was shown to Marilyn Redmond. She later identified Hooper in an in-person lineup.

Courts also rebuffed attempts by Hooper’s lawyers to order fingerprint and DNA testing on evidence from the killings.

Authorities say Hooper and two other men forced their way into the Redmond home on Dec. 31, 1980. The three victims were bound, gagged, robbed and shot in the head.

Two other men, William Bracy and Edward McCall, were convicted in the killings but died before their death sentences could be carried out.

Authorities say Robert Cruz, who was alleged to have had ties to organized crime, hired Hooper, Bracy and McCall to kill Pat Redmond, who co-owned a printing business. They said Cruz wanted to take over the business and was unhappy that Redmond had rejected his offers to enter several printing contracts with Las Vegas hotels, according to court records. Cruz was acquitted of murder charges in both deaths in 1995.

Hooper’s execution came the same day that Stephen Barbee was set to receive a lethal injection in Texas for the February 2005 deaths of Lisa Underwood, 34, and her son Jayden. That would be the 15th execution in the U.S. this year, up from last year’s three-decade low of 11.

The executions come despite waning support in recent years for the death penalty across all political parties. About 6 in 10 Americans favor the death penalty, according to the General Social Survey, a major trends survey conducted by NORC at the University of Chicago. While a majority continue to express support for the death penalty, the share has declined steadily since the 1990s, when nearly three-quarters were in favor.

Kenneth Thompson Murdered In Prison

Kenneth Thompson was sentenced to death by the State of Arizona however other prisoners decided to speed up the time line and would murder him inside of the Arizona Department Of Corrections. Kenneth Thompson would receive a death sentence after traveling from Missouri to Arizona where he would murder his sister in law and her boyfriend before setting the house on fire. Kenneth Thompson tried to blame Scientology for the murder as his beliefs taught him that psychology was evil. The Arizona Department of Corrections have said they believe two people are responsible for Kenneth Thompson murder however the names have yet to be made public

Kenneth Thompson More News

Kenneth Thompson — the Missouri man who traveled to Arizona, killed his sister-in-law and her boyfriend and used Scientology as a defense — died Wednesday, according to the Arizona Department of Corrections, Rehabilitation and Reentry. Officials are investigating his death as an apparent homicide.

Thompson was pronounced dead shortly after 1 p.m. Wednesday, the department announced. He was found in his “assigned housing unit where life-saving measures were conducted,” the department said. He was an inmate in the Arizona State Prison Complex Eyman, in Florence.

The department has identified two suspects, also inmates, “for the attack,” but did not offer more details.

Thompson’s crime was shocking, and the subsequent northern Arizona trial was gripping. In 2012, he traveled to Arizona from his home in Missouri and used a hatchet and a knife to kill his sister-in-law and her boyfriend. He poured acid on their bodies, set the Prescott Valley house on fire and fled.

A Prescott jury in 2019 found him guilty of first-degree murder, burglary, arson, criminal damage and tampering with evidence. He was sentenced to death.

Whether Thompson killed his sister-in-law and her boyfriend — Penelope Edwards and Troy Dunn — wasn’t up for debate in his 2019 trial. His attorneys didn’t dispute that.

But they took issue with the prosecution’s portrait of Thompson as a premeditated killer. He was concerned about the two children in his sister-in-law’s care, they argued.

Thompson’s wife had taken care of them while Penelope Edwards was in prison. Once she was released and got the children back, Thompson and his wife often worried about them. When Thompson learned one of the children was receiving psychiatric treatment at a children’s hospital, that was the last straw.

Thompson was raised as a Scientologist and his attorneys argued that Scientologists view psychology as “evil and a scam.” He believed he was on a mission to rescue these children from spiritual death, they argued.

Court testimony helped piece together a narrative of what happened in Prescott Valley in 2012.

Thompson took off for Arizona. His attorneys said even his then-wife, Gloria, didn’t know about his plans. He had told her he was heading to Memphis to deal with legal issues surrounding his parents’ estate.

His attorneys said he arrived at a junction at Interstate 40 and impulsively decided to bear west, heading to Arizona. As he drove to Arizona, which court testimony said took him just more than one day, Gloria began texting him. But Thompson left his phone at home.

He stayed at a motel. He went to Walmart the next morning to buy a hatchet and a change of clothes. His attorneys maintained the hatchet was for a camping trip he planned.

He took a taxi to his sister-in-law’s house. Details became much more muddled after that.

Thompson told the jury he wanted to bribe his sister-in-law into letting him bring the children back to Missouri with him. The Prescott Daily Courier reported he testified to the jury for almost four hours.

He claimed the conversation turned violent. His attorneys said he struck in the heat of passion. They asked for a manslaughter verdict.

Hours after he arrived at his sister-in-law’s home, neighbors reported a house fire. Responding crews discovered the victims’ bodies. Police pulled Thompson over on I-40 heading east.

A search revealed a hatchet with human hair and blood on its blade.

https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/local/arizona-breaking/2021/12/30/convicted-murderer-kenneth-thompson-who-used-scientology-as-defense-found-dead-in-arizona-prison/9059881002/

Richard Stokley Arizona Execution

Richard Stokley was executed by the State of Arizona for the kidnapping and murders of two 13 year old girls. According to court documents Richard Stokley and Randy Brazeal would kidnap the two 13 year old girls, Mandy Myers and Mary Snyder , who were driven out to the desert where they were sexually assaulted and murdered. Randy Brazeal would testify against Richard Stokley in exchange for the death penalty off the table. Richard Stokley would be sentenced to death and would be executed by lethal injection December 5 2012

Richard Stokley More News

For 20 years, Patty Hancock refused to buy new Christmas stockings for her children because they wouldn’t match the one that belonged to her slain daughter, Mandy.

After the execution Wednesday of one of the two men who raped and murdered Mandy and her friend Mary Snyder on July 8, 1991, Hancock announced she was ready to begin a new phase in her life. It is OK to get new stockings.

Richard Dale Stokley, 60, was pronounced dead at 11:12 a.m. after receiving an injection of pentobarbital.

Richard Stokley was sentenced to die in July 1992 for killing Mandy Meyers and her friend Mary. Both girls were 13.

His death was witnessed by more than a dozen family members and lawyers involved in the case.

Richard Stokley was chatty with the medical personnel who spent 52 minutes trying to find veins that could be used to administer the pentobarbital – a drug used to both sedate an inmate and stop his heart. But when Stokley was asked if he had any final words, he simply responded, “Nah.”

He warned the medical team he had hepatitis, told a phlebotomist joke and assured them he was doing fine.

“I grew up a long time ago,” Stokley said. “I do wish I could die doing something meaningful, you know. This seems like such a waste.”

After finally assessing the final vein they needed, one of the team members told Stokley he “did good.”

“Thank you,” Stokley replied. “You did too, all of you young guys and all of you all.”

The pentobarbital rendered Stokley unconscious five minutes after the first dose was administered. The second dose was then given.

At 11:03 a.m. Stokley’s body convulsed one time. He was pronounced dead nine minutes later. He never looked at the crowd watching from the other side of the glass.

Hancock said Richard Stokley should have apologized to the families but wasn’t surprised he did not. “What do you expect from a heartless man with no soul?” she asked.

Dennis Hancock married Patty Hancock, 56, exactly one week prior to Mandy’s death.

“We’ll finally have a holiday where we don’t have someone on death row or in prison,” Dennis Hancock said. “I hope it will be a joyous one, but there will always be someone missing.”

Mary’s sister, Elisha Gonzales, broke down when recounting all of the milestones her sister never got to experience.

Stokley’s execution was a “long time in coming” and now there will hopefully be a time of healing and peace, Gonzales, 39, said. Her parents were not emotionally up to witnessing the execution, but were on the grounds of the prison, Gonzales said

On July 7, 1991, Mary and Mandy went to a community celebration near Elfrida. Witnesses said they saw 20-year-old Randy Brazeal talking to the girls at their campsite and later while next to Brazeal’s father’s car with Stokley beside him.

About 1 a.m., the girls told friends they were going to the restroom, and they were never seen alive again.

The next day, Brazeal turned himself in to Chandler police and Richard Stokley was arrested in Benson.

The girls’ nude bodies were found in an abandoned mine shaft. They’d been raped, strangled, stabbed and stomped.

Brazeal was sentenced to two concurrent terms of 20 years after being allowed to plead guilty to second-degree murder. He had invoked his right to a speedy trial, and prosecutors said they offered him a plea agreement for fear they would not have the DNA evidence back from the lab before his trial date.

Brazeal was released from prison last year and is now living in another state, Hancock said. Although Stokley is now dead, there will never really be closure for her because Brazeal is out there, Hancock said.

“I’m worried I will get a phone call that he murdered someone else’s children,” Hancock said.

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected Stokley’s final appeal on Tuesday

At the time of this sentencing on July 14, 1992, Stokley said he did not deny culpability, but said there was no premeditation on his part. He also said he’d been made a scapegoat.

“What I am guilty of is being an irresponsible person for most of my life, running from responsibility, living in a fantasy world, and it was my irresponsibility on the night that this incident occurred that involved me in the incident. … There is no words that can express the grief and the sorrow and the torment I have experienced over this, but I am just going to leave everything in the hands of God because that’s where it is anyway.”

For his last meal Stokley ordered a porterhouse steak, french fries, fried okra, a salad, a 2-ounce wedge of cheddar cheese, two biscuits, a banana, an apple, a peach, chocolate ice cream and cream soda.

Stokley was the sixth person to be executed in Arizona this year.

https://tucson.com/news/local/crime/stokley-makes-no-apology-is-executed/article_5ecbefc5-9c16-568f-b2d5-90e830611585.html

Daniel Cook Arizona Execution

Daniel Cook was executed by the State of Arizona for the sexual assault and murders of two men. According to court documents Daniel Cook would sexually assault and murder two men that he worked with at a restaurant in the middle of a robbery. Daniel Cook would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. Daniel Cook would be executed by lethal injection on August 8 2012

Daniel Cook More News

On July 19, 1987, Daniel Wayne Cook stole money from his roommate, Carlos Ramos, who was also a coworker of his at a restaurant in Lake Havasu City. When Ramos, a Guatemalan national, began searching for the money, Cook lured him into his bedroom where he and another roommate, John Matzke, tied Ramos to a chair and began a night of horrifying torture.

Over the span of six to seven hours, Cook and Matzke beat Ramos with a metal pipe and a wooden stick, Matzke cut Ramos across the chest with a knife while Cook sodomized him, burned his genitals with a cigarette and stapled his foreskin to the chair. Ramos remarkably lived through the torture before having his throat crushed by both Cook and Matzke as they pushed on it with the metal pipe.

Later that night, another coworker, 16-year-old Kevin Swaney, arrived at the home and was forced upstairs to see Ramos’ body. While Matzke slept, Cook sodomized Swaney and after Matzke woke, they strangled Swaney with a bed sheet.

On July 21, Matzke turned himself in to the Lake Havasu Police Department. Police arrested Matzke and Cook after finding the bodies of the victims in Matzke’s closet.

After his arrest, Cook was asked how the bodies got into the closet and he told police, “We got to partying, things got out of hand now two people are dead.”

The trial started on June 27 and lasted ten days. Matzke pled guilty to a second-degree murder charge and testified against Cook.

Cook was initially represented by a public defender, however prior to trial, Cook decided to waive his right to counsel and to represent himself. The trial judge strongly advised Cook against this but accepted his waiver of counsel as “knowingly, intelligently, and voluntarily” given, and appointed Cook’s former counsel to continue in the role of trial advisor.

On appeal, Cook’s appeal lawyers accused the trial lawyer of being drunk and incompetent, thus forcing Cook to represent himself. In his appeal, he reported that his attorney did virtually no investigating, and developed no “theory of defense” or “plan for mitigation.” Cook also said he smelled alcohol on his breath in court.

They also said that when Cook asked to represent himself the judge never asked him why or informed him of his option to retain a different lawyer.

Cook’s appeal attorneys won a short reprieve in April 2011, when the U.S. Supreme Court stopped the execution to consider a claim saying that he “did not have effective legal counsel.” Lawyers said previous counsel failed to present evidence that he was physically and sexually abused by family members and a foster care worker when he was a child. However, the supreme court later dismissed the appeal, clearing the way for him to be executed.

In paperwork filed at his clemency hearing Cook is shown as “a seriously mentally ill individual because, in part, he endured a childhood replete with sexual and physical abuse.” It goes on to describe the abuse he suffered, “The horrors that Dan (Cook) suffered were the same horrors that Kevin and Carlos suffered. Dan’s grandparents tied him to chairs as punishment; he was repeatedly raped as a child; his father burned his genitals with cigarettes; his sexual abuser had him circumcised as a teenager; and he was beaten with belts, boards, and fists. Each of these acts was done to one or both of the victims.”

n his adult life, his attorneys reported, Cook covered his pain with drugs, alcohol and self-inflicted injuries. Cook spent some time in the U.S. Army Reserves, but he was honorably discharged. They reported that Cook lacked the ability “to adjust to the stress of military life, as evidenced by his self-inflicted injury.”

In his clemency hearing it was reported that the prosecuting attorney Eric Larsen said: “Had I been informed of this mitigating information regarding Dan’s severely abusive and traumatic childhood and his mental illnesses, I would have not sought the death penalty in this case.”

His attorneys pleaded with the clemency board to reduce his sentence to life imprisonment without parole, but they were unsuccessful.

https://www.abc15.com/news/crime/death-row-diaries-tortured-man-tortures-co-workers-the-story-of-daniel-cook

Samuel Lopez Arizona Execution

Samuel Lopez was executed by the State of Arizona for the sexual assault and murder of a woman. According to court documents Samuel Lopez would sexually assault and murder 59 year old Estafana Holmes. Samuel Lopez would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death. Samuel Lopez would be executed by lethal injection on June 27 2012

Samuel Lopez More News

Death-row inmate Samuel Villegas Lopez stared straight ahead Wednesday as he lay strapped to a table in Arizona’s execution chamber, wincing slightly as two catheters that soon would deliver a fatal drug were inserted into his veins.

Lopez’s execution was the first in Arizona history in which witnesses other than prison officials saw catheters inserted into an inmate’s veins — a move the state Department of Corrections made after a federal judge recently sided with The Associated Press and Idaho news organizations seeking full viewing access to lethal injections.

The ruling was upheld by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, meaning it was unlikely Arizona would have been able to keep its process limited much longer.

Until Wednesday, news media and victims’ family members entered the death chamber at the state prison only after the inmate had been injected and covered with a sheet to his chest or neck.

This time, they watched on television screens set up in the death chamber as the execution team inserted Lopez with the catheters behind a curtain. The curtain was lifted just before a fatal dose of pentobarbital was sent coursing through Lopez’s veins.

During the process, Lopez blinked often and showed no signs he was experiencing pain, although he slightly winced once.

As the execution team checked his veins, Lopez asked, “It look all right?” to which they responded: “We’re doing good.”

Toward the end, Lopez said he had a question: “Are these the only two IV lines going to be inserted in me?”

Once the curtains were pulled, Lopez stared straight ahead and ignored the nine family members of his murder victim who were in the room to watch him die. When asked if he had last words, he said in a clear voice: “No, I do not.”

As the drug was delivered, Lopez began breathing heavily, closing his eyes and yawning once before he appeared to fall asleep with his mouth slightly open. He didn’t move again after that.

The execution ended at 10:37 a.m., about 40 minutes after the insertion process began. Unlike Idaho, Arizona did not allow witnesses watch as Lopez was brought into the death chamber and strapped to the table at his ankles and wrists and over his torso.

Dale Baich, a defense attorney who witnessed the execution and represents many death-row inmates in Arizona, said the new process was a “step forward in creating transparency.” But he said he hopes the Corrections Department eventually will allow witnesses to view the process from the very beginning.

Lopez, 49, was executed three days before his 50th birthday for the brutal rape and murder of 59-year-old Estafana Holmes of Phoenix about 26 years ago.

Her brother, Victor Arguijo of Fort Worth, Texas, and other family members from Phoenix and Texas addressed members of the media after watching the execution. They said they were not there for revenge but for justice for Holmes, a poor seamstress and grandmother who lived alone and whom they called “Tefo.”

“It’s been a long and difficult and frustrating road,” Arguijo said. “We now know and have confidence that the judicial system works for victims and their families even though at times our faith has wavered.”

He said the family hopes Lopez’s death brings them closure and that Holmes’ “soul and spirit will now finally rest in peace.”

Lopez’s attorney, Kelley Henry, said in a statement that his legal team was “deeply troubled” by the execution. She reiterated her arguments that Lopez was “denied due process at every level,” from his trial until recently, as courts declined to delay the execution to hear about his abusive and difficult childhood.

That evidence was never presented at trial and could have served as a mitigating factor and gotten him a sentence of life in prison rather than death.

“If we are going to have the death penalty, we should ensure that the process, at the very least, is fair and that it follows the rule of law,” Henry said. “Sadly, that did not happen in this case.”

Lopez was the state’s fourth death-row inmate executed this year. Of the 125 inmates still on Arizona’s death row, only five have been there longer than him.

Arizona is on pace to execute three more men this year, which would match the state’s busiest year for executions and make it one of the nation’s busiest death-penalty states.

Among Lopez’s failed last-minute efforts to avoid the death penalty was a request with the Arizona Supreme Court to delay his execution until the state had a new governor, arguing Gov. Jan Brewer and the state’s clemency board were prejudiced against him.

Brewer overhauled the clemency board in April, putting three new people on the five-member panel in what defense attorneys said was an obvious effort to appoint “political cronies” who would never recommend lessening a death-row inmate’s sentence to life in prison.

Brewer has denied that allegation through spokesman Matt Benson, who has said the board was changed to bring fresh insight to the process.

Lopez’s attorneys say board members were improperly appointed and didn’t have the authority to consider death-penalty cases because of open-meetings violations, statements to members of the media that showed prejudice, and other factors.

At Lopez’s clemency board hearing Friday, board members called him the “worst of the worst” and said the brutality of his crime and Holmes’ heartbroken family members held great sway with them. They voted unanimously against recommending his sentence be reduced to life in prison or that it be delayed in any way.

In an affidavit provided to the board, Lopez wrote that he has no memory of the crime because he had been spending so much time sniffing paint that he would forget entire days.

“What happened to Ms. Holmes was so horrible and so wrong,” he wrote. “I’ve always been sorry for what she went through that night and for what her family has gone through ever since.”

Lopez’s own family did not attend the execution.

Police found Holmes’ half-naked body Oct. 30, 1986, in her small apartment.

The petite woman had three major stab wounds to her head, one on her face, and 23 in her left breast and upper chest. She had been blindfolded and gagged with her own clothing, and her throat had been slit. Blood was splattered on walls in the kitchen, bathroom and bedroom.

Semen found on her body matched Lopez’s after he was arrested in a separate rape less than a week later.

The state Supreme Court in 1993 upheld Lopez’s death sentence, saying the state of Holmes’ apartment and her body showed a “terrific struggle for life” and calling the killing a “grisly and ultimately fatal nightmare.”

Lopez, who was 24 at the time, did not know Holmes, who lived alone and was described by her family as hardworking, loving and deeply religious.

https://www.deseret.com/2012/6/27/20421226/arizona-inmate-executed-in-more-open-process