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Daniel Frank was the first criminal to be executed.Not much information has been given.
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Pennsylvania was the first state to move the execution away from the public and do them in a correctional facility.
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Michigan was the first state to abolish the death penalty for all crimes except for treason. Later on Rhode Island and Wisconsin followed. By the end of the century,Venezuela, Portugal, Netherlands, Costa Rica, Brazil and Ecuador would follow suit.
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William Kemmler was the first person executed by electrocution for killing his wife. After being sat down in the electric chair, he did not resist,cry, or plead for his life because he believed he was going to a better place. After 1,000 volts went through his body, he was still breathing and alive. He was then ordered back to chair and recieved 2,000 volts.
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Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti, anarchist sympathizers were tried and convicted muder. They murdered 2 guys during an armed robbery. As a result, the U.S Embassy in Buernos Aires was bombed.
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Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were the first Americans to be convoted and sentenced to death for espionage and treason. They were caught selling atomic secrets to the U.S.S.R ( Soviet Unions). They were American communists and the first civilians to be executed for espionage.
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Charles Brooks Jr. was tried and convicted of murder in 1976. Brooks and his accomplice Loudres, kidnapped a mechanic that they bound and shoved into the trunk of their vehicle. They took him to a motel where he was taped and shot in the head. Loudres gave his testimony for a 40 year sentence while Brooks got the death penalty.
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Caryl Chessman was convicted for rape and robbery. While on death row he became famous by writing a book called Cell 2455: Death Row. He was charged on 17 counts of rape, kidnapping and robbery.
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Gary Gilmore was executed by firing squad in Utah. He had a very unstable childhood and after being released on parole in 1976, he shot and killed 2 men. He was tried and executed by a volunteer firing squad in 1977.
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Troy Davis was executed by lethal injection after his last minute pleawas ignored by the supreme court. Many people felt this was a miscarriage of justice and voiced their opinions. Davis was covicted of killing an off-duty police officer in 1991
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Cameron WIllingham was accused of killing his 3 daughters by burning down their home in 1991. Despite the plea from his wife and the the evidence from the Texas Forensice Science Commison, the governor denied the pleaand he was executed in 2004.
