Gary Gilmore

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Gary Mark Gilmore (born December 4, 1940 in Waco , McCamey or Stonewall , Texas , † January 17, 1977 in Draper , Utah ) was an American robbery . He was the first to be executed in the United States after a ten-year de facto moratorium on the use of the death penalty.

biography

Gary Gilmore's childhood was marked by abuse and violence, and he spent his youth in correctional institutions. Of the last 21 years of his life, he had been in prison for 18 years.

Gilmore had only a brief relationship with Nicole Baker Barrett, the end of which had a significant impact on his later actions.

Accused of the murder of the 24-year-old tank attendant Max David Jensen on July 19, 1976 in Orem and of the 25-year-old City Center motel manager Ben Bushnell on July 20, 1976 in Provo , not far from Brigham Young University , he was in custody against any attempt at external defense and directed his two lawyers to seek the death penalty for him . He pursued his proceedings with all his might; he was arrested in July, sentenced in October and executed in January. However, the process was too lengthy for him, so he made two suicide attempts while in detention . Gilmore was sentenced to death, as expected, and since the state of Utah offered a convict between hang and execution , Gilmore chose to shoot. Following the atonement of the Mormons in the state of Utah, the blood is said to touch the ground at death. Since his two victims, as well as his mother Bessie, were Mormons, Gilmore opted for the Mormon doctrine of shooting, which he believed to be a death " with grace and dignity " "a death with grace and dignity."

After three postponements, the unofficial moratorium on the death penalty in the USA ended on January 17, 1977 at 8:08 a.m. with the execution of the sentence . The moratorium had been in force since 1967 and was reinforced by a ruling by the Supreme Court in 1972 , but was repealed again in 1976.

For the hangman's meal , Gilmore chose a steak with potatoes, milk, and coffee.

Gilmore's last words before the execution were: “Let's do it” or “Let's do it”.

The death penalty was carried out on January 17, 1977 in Utah State Prison . Gary Gilmore's body was cremated and his ashes were scattered by air over the village of Spanish Fork , where he had last spent time with his great love, Nicole Baker Barrett.

Trivia

The fact that he donated the corneas of his eyes for transplants inspired TV Smith to write the song Gary Gilmore's Eyes , which he wrote for punk band The Adverts .

The British industrial band Throbbing Gristle and the American artist Monte Cazazza produced a “Gary Gilmore Memorial Postcard”, on which the execution was recreated. The image, which was sold over 6000 times as a T-shirt, was so convincing that it was considered real by the Hong Kong Daily News and printed.

The American writer Norman Mailer processed the story of Gilmore in The Executioner's Song , published in 1979 and controversially discussed in the United States . Mailer claims that Gary Gilmore's grandfather was the escapologist and magician Harry Houdini . American artist Matthew Barney processed this in his five-part Cremaster Cycle , in which Norman Mailer plays the role of Houdini and Matthew Barney takes on the role of Gilmore.

Gilmore's last words "Let's do it" inspired Dan Wieden, the co-founder of the advertising agency Wieden + Kennedy, to write the now world-famous advertising slogan of the shoe brand Nike "Just do it".

Lawrence Schiller interviewed Gilmore, which turned into a documentary with original recordings and the title "Dead Man Talking - The Execution of Gary Gilmore".

literature

  • Norman Mailer: The Executioner's Song. Little Brown & Company, Boston 1979, ISBN 0-316-54417-5 .
  • Mikal Gilmore : Shot in the Heart. Anchor Books, 1994, ISBN 0-385-47800-3 (Ger. The Heart of Violence. Goldmann, 1994, ISBN 3-442-30607-8 ).
  • Jürgen Martschukat: With Grace and Dignity: Gary Gilmore and the return of the death penalty in the USA, 1977. Presentation at the 44th German Historians' Day, 2002.
  • Michael Klemm : Death row Valley play about Gary Gilmore. World premiere of the Franconian Theater Schloss Massbach, 2005.

documentary

  • "Biography - Gary Gilmore," 2000

Web links

swell

  1. ↑ Mikal Gilmore: Shot in the Heart. 1994, ISBN 0-385-47800-3 (German The Heart of Violence, 1994, ISBN 3-442-30607-8 ).
  2. ^ Museum Ludwig Cologne, Matthew Barney - The Cremaster Cycle Archive link ( Memento of the original from September 27, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.museenkoeln.de
  3. ↑ Talking - The Execution of Gary Gilmore. Retrieved January 19, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Gilmore, Gary
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Gilmore, Gary Mark (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American robbery
DATE OF BIRTH 4th December 1940
PLACE OF BIRTH Waco , McCamey or Stonewall , Texas
DATE OF DEATH 17th January 1977
Place of death Draper , Utah