Well, it wasn’t “botched”...
At least not as bad as Thomas Edison’s infamous DC electrocution, where, I believe, the persons head started smoking while they were still quite alive...
Actually, it was AC. Edison wanted to prove how dangerous alternating current was, as developed by his rival George Westinghouse, was.
***Thomas Edison’s infamous DC electrocution,***
Edison used AC power to show that Westinghouse’s proposed AC power grid was too deadly and dangerous! The victim did smoke and was not killed till several tries.
Edison wanted a DC power grid.
http://pandawhale.com/post/29421/what-bill-gates-learned-from-thomas-edison "By the way, Edison was not a great human being. He was greedy, petty, and an absolute jerk to Tesla: Simply put Edison (with a few other moguls on his side) didn’t want to see Tesla’s Alternate Current succeed, because it posed a (fiscal) threat to the viability of his Direct Current (which Tesla had previously souped up for him). A bitter public battle took place, with George Westinghouse of the Westinghouse Company on Tesla’s side. Edison sought to use spineless scare tactics to convince the public his AC units weren’t safe. In order to “prove” this “fact,” he had a number of animals electrocuted, including a circus elephant (which was to be put to death for killing a some people). Ultimately, Tesla won this “War of Currents,” only because he indeed had the better power mechanism. Although the current of success swept into a place of high regard, he forewent obscene wealth so as to–in a show of unprecedented humility–save the Westinghouse Company (which would have gone broke with the royalty payments). Instead, Tesla made a few grand by just selling his patents outright. Tesla was a good man. Edison was ambitious but he was not a good man.