Oh, the irony!

In 1989, a guy called Michael Anderson Godwin was waiting in his death row cell for an execution day, as he was supposed to be sent to the electric chair.

One day, his TV broke and the guy decided to try to fix it playing around with the cables, or more specifically, chewing on them while he was on the toilet. The Universe at that point must have decided that the Criminal Justice system was a bit slow, because with the metal toilet as a conductor, Godwin died by electrocution. Oh well, it was going to be a matter of time anyway.

(Please get the Tywin Lannister reference).

The guy who felt the buzz.

The first ever execution by electric chair went horribly wrong: in 1890 a guy named William Kemmler had the “honour” to be the guinea pig for this new execution method.
The warden was pretty nervous himself when the time came for Kemmler to meet his maker, even more than the prisoner himself, whose words of encouragement for his executioner have been recorded: “Take your time; don’t be in a hurry. Do it well; be sure everything is all right,” he told him.
So, at first things seemed going well: the warden flipped the switch, and ten seconds later Kemmler looked pretty dead.
When, a few minutes later, a cut on his hand started bleeding, indicating that he was still alive, the warden panicked and quickly ordered the current to be restarted. This time the procedure went on for a while, and the poor guy even drooled and moaned until he literally started sizzling due to his body being “cooked” to death.

As guilty as a cheeseburger

Speaking of last meals, the inmates’ choices can show how guilty or innocent they feel: statistically, prisoners that profess their innocence tend to have less food or skip their meal altogether in sign of protest.

Check, please!

Most prisons in the U.S. set a $40 limit on last meals for inmates facing imminent execution.

Might have been lethal injection here.

By law, an autopsy is required on all the executed criminals in the United States. Not because there’s any doubt on how they died (“Hmm, it looks to me that the patient has died of lethal injection. What do you think, Carl?”), but to make sure the anesthetic worked and the prisoner died a painless death.