1936: Rainey Bethea, America’s last public hanging

ExecutedToday.com ^ | August 14, 2008 | Headsman

[CheshireTheCat]

On this date in 1936, thousands thronged Owensboro, Kentucky, for a glimpse of what would prove to be the last public hanging in the United States.

The U.S. followed the trend of its onetime mother country, England, in moving the formerly iconic public hanging increasingly behind closed doors, but its federalist structure made that change uneven. In Kentucky itself at this time, the law displayed sedimentary layers of death penalty history.

Caught up for killing a 70-year-old woman — done in the midst of a drunken burglary, he had left a telltale ring at the scene; fingerprint analysis also helped establish his guilt — Rainey Bethea was on the hook for murder, robbery and rape. The former two indictments would have subjected him to (private) electrocution at the state penitentiary. The latter charge still carried the punishment of public hanging in the local county seat.

Bethea was charged only with rape....

[Pontiac]

Ambitious and irresponsible reporters and photographers who swarmed into Owensboro for the Bethea hanging dipped their ready hands into the cloaca of evil designs and plastered over the name of this fair city the dirty results of their pandering.

I see that news paper reporting was every bit as professional in the past as it is today.

[dp0622]

And unbiased :-)

[The Truth Will Make You Free]

And further on: The putrid pens of those who wore the garb of the news profession painted in lurid colors purported happenings, and it is sad but true that such distorted reports are accepted while the plain statement of facts is discarded as an attempted apology.

[Clutch Martin]

Methods of Execution: Hanging. Until the 1890s, hanging was the primary method of execution used in the United States. Hanging is still used in Delaware and Washington, although both have lethal injection as an alternative method of execution. The last hanging to take place was January 25, 1996 in Delaware.

Rainy Bethea might have the last public hanging, which the article points out. Not to be confused with the last PUBLIC hanging.

[Pontiac]

History doesn’t repeat itself but it rhymes.

[Pontiac]

At least back then reporters, even those out in the hinterlands of Kentucky, could actually write an intelligent sentence.

[Bratch]

The perpetrator.

[ConservaTeen]

Bethea was only charged with rape? Harvey Weinstein must be glad we don’t hang for that now!!

[SERE_DOC]

"Bethea was only charged with rape? Harvey Weinstein must be glad we don’t hang for that now!!"

Or Bill Cosby

[Karma_Sherab]

Bethea was only charged with rape?

Well, to be honest, back then, consensual sex between a black man and a white woman was viewed as rape and carried the death penalty mostly

[Bonemaker]

Time to bring it back!😎 "So if you are a blackguard, a thug or ne'er-do-well You'd better pray to Jesus to save your soul from hell 'Cause there's a noose that fits your neck, no matter small or big And at its end you'll kick your feet and dance the Tyburn Jig Hey!"