Word: barfield
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...here at Harvard--this bastion of Establishment liberalism--that in the days that followed, informed public opinion, as gauged by this amateur pulse-taker, swung decidedly in favor of the death penalty. "Kill the mother-fucker" was the gist of the reaction I got from friends and acquaintances. Velma Barfield's victims were one thing, but this...
...only one of three convicts put to death last week, and the 29th since the Supreme Court effectively reinstated the death penalty in 1976. But the case of Margie Velma Barfield, 52, was different, and not just because she was the first woman executed in the U.S. since...
Convicted six years ago of poisoning her fiance, Barfield, once a private nurse, confessed to killing three other people: her mother and two patients. Nevertheless, she attracted a fervent following who believed her claims that she had acted under the influence of a variety of prescription drugs...
...Barfield spent her last months crocheting dolls for two of her grandchildren, reading religious literature and talking to reporters, who dubbed her the Death Row Granny. Democratic Governor James Hunt, locked in a tight race to win Republican Jesse Helms' Senate seat, refused to grant clemency, and last week her final court appeal was rejected. At 2 a.m. on Friday, wearing pink pajamas, Barfield was executed by lethal injection at North Carolina Central Prison. She said, "I am sorry for all the hurt I have caused...
Though Hunt, like his opponent and the majority of the state, supports the death penalty, the Barfield case was painfully complex. If executed, she would be the first woman prisoner put to death in the U.S. since 1962. Barfield's claim that she murdered while addicted to prescription drugs and has since recovered her sanity and discovered God has mobilized a fervent lobby of supporters. The execution is scheduled for Nov. 2. Despite its potential impact on the election, Hunt felt he had no choice. "Death by arsenic poisoning is slow and agonizing ... I cannot in good conscience justify...