It is also unnecessary,” she told USA TODAY.
As the execution approaches, USA TODAY is looking back at the crime, who Smith is, and who his victims were.
Chad, a high school sophomore, was found lying in a pool of blood on his back in the kitchen, court records said.
On several occasions, Smith is said to have offered money to anybody willing to kill his estranged wife, court records said.
Contributing: Kelly Puente, Nashville Tennessean and Natalie Neysa Alund, USA TODAY Fernando Cervantes Jr. is a trending news reporter for USA TODAY.
A detective who worked the decades-old case said that the triple murders committed by Tennessee death row inmate Oscar Franklin Smith prove one thing: “True evil exists.”. “.
Smith, 75, will be put to death by lethal injection for the 1989 murders of his estranged wife, Judith Robirds Smith, 35, and her sons, Jason Burnett, 13, and Chad Burnett, 16. The three were killed inside their house in Nashville.
The Tennessean, a publication of the USA TODAY Network, reported in 2022 that retired Detective Pat Postiglione of the Metro Nashville Police Department said, “The boys were brutalized.”. “Real evil does exist. “.”.
Kelley Henry, Smith’s lawyer, told USA TODAY that Smith has consistently insisted on his innocence and that the past two weeks have been difficult for him due to the fact that he was placed in a small cell close to the execution chamber by corrections officials.
Isolation of this kind is extremely traumatic. Additionally, it’s not necessary,” she told USA TODAY. “In the two weeks before execution, there has never been any trouble on Tennessee’s death row. “..”.
Looking back at the crime, Smith, and his victims as the execution draws near, USA TODAY writes.
Oscar Franklin Smith was found guilty of what?
At night in October. According to court records, on January 1, 1989, 13-year-old Jason Burnett called 911 and screamed, “Help me!” while his brother’s jumbled voice could be heard saying, “Frank, no! God help me.”.
Police responded to the home after the frantic call, reported seeing nothing out of the ordinary, and dismissed the call as a false alarm, according to court documents. Inside, however, their mother and both boys had been killed.
An eight-year-old relative discovered the three bodies inside the house, their throats slashed from ear to ear, fifteen hours after the 911 call.
The Tennessean reported that Judith Robirds Smith had been stabbed several times and had been shot in the neck and left arm. When his mother was in the bed, eight-year-old Jason was lying on his side.
According to court records, Chad, a sophomore in high school, was discovered in the kitchen, lying on his back in a pool of blood. He had sustained multiple stab wounds from a knife and a sharp, needle-like weapon, and he had been shot through his left eye, upper chest, and shoulder.
The following day, Smith was questioned by police. His response to learning of the murder of his estranged family was viewed by them as a warning sign.
Tom Thurman, a former deputy district attorney for Davidson County, told The Tennessean, “He showed no emotion when they told him.”.
What preceded the killings of the mother and two sons?
According to court documents, Smith had tied up, raped, and threatened to kill his estranged wife a month prior to the murders, and he had threatened her several times before the killings.
According to court documents, Smith also threatened to kill her and even told her father that he would kill his daughter on multiple occasions when she called the Waffle House where she worked.
“You tell Judy that I have been playing with her wearing kid gloves, but now the gloves are coming off,” Smith said to Judy’s father. In court documents, prosecutors claimed that he had previously threatened to kill Judy if she ever left him.
According to court documents, Smith allegedly offered money to anyone who would kill his estranged wife on multiple occasions.
Smith’s previous marriage produced two adolescent children, and Judy Smith’s previous marriage produced two sons, Jason and Chad.
The couple had twin boys when they were married in 1985. However, they split up in June 1989, and a fight over the twins’ custody broke out.
Police were informed by Judy Smith’s sister Teresa Zastrow that Smith had repeatedly mistreated her. In 1988, Judy asked her father, Don Robirds, and his wife to sign a note informing her husband of her whereabouts, according to The Tennessean.
“She came to the house once and said she needed a signed paper before she could leave,” Robirds recalled. “The paper needed to be signed by my wife.”. Judy had only ever given us that one genuine hint. “.”.
Smith aims to evade the death sentence.
The execution date for Smith, the oldest prisoner on Tennessee’s death row, has been set three times before being postponed for a variety of reasons. Smith would be the 19th prisoner to be executed in the United States and the first in Tennessee since 2020 if the execution goes forward this time. A. this year. .
In 2022, Smith was last on the verge of being put to death, but the execution was canceled an hour before it was set to take place.
Then, Republican Gov. Because of a mistake in the state’s lethal injection procedure, Bill Lee granted a temporary reprieve. In the end, the oversight resulted in a new protocol, an independent audit, and a three-year moratorium on executions in Tennessee.
Smith is scheduled to be the first execution in the state since 2020 after that moratorium ends, but his defense attorneys filed a lawsuit alleging a high risk of torturous death alongside eight other death row inmates to contest Tennessee’s new procedure.
In a letter to Lee in April, lawyer Amy Harwell stated, “We have real and legitimate concerns that the new protocol − which has even fewer safeguards than the last − will expose our clients to the fear, suffering, and anguish that comes from the act of poisoning called for in the protocol.”.
The state of Tennessee’s use of pentobarbital, which Harwell claimed in the letter can prolong executions by up to 20 minutes and leave the inmate conscious while undergoing what she referred to as “chemical waterboarding,” is the main source of their worries. “..”.
State officials contend that the method of execution is both efficient and constitutional.
Further paving the way for the execution, Lee denied Smith’s request for clemency on Tuesday.
USA TODAY’s Natalie Neysa Alund and Nashville, Tennessee’s Kelly Puente contributed.
Fernando Cervantes Jr. works for USA TODAY as a trending news reporter. You can reach him at Fernando. He can be followed on X at @fern_cerv_ and at cervantes@gannett . com.
