This was the last thing he ever said, before the execution was carried out.
What makes someone say that? And what do others choose to say or not say when they know it's the end?
Between 1983 and 2017, Texas carried out 545 executions.
It starts in the courtroom. The verdict is read. “Death Sentence.”
They’re taken to death row, a separate prison unit built only for those awaiting execution.
Each inmate spends their days in a small cell, with limited interaction, alone with nothing but their thoughts. They know why they are here.
The end doesn’t come early it makes them wait.
But not all waits are the same.
From 1983 to 2017, the average time an inmate spent on Texas death row was about 10 years.
314 of 545 inmates spent less than that. The shortest was for 252 days before the execution was carried out
But 210 inmates spent a decade or more. The longest wait was for 30 year.
Some arrived young and died old.
And then the day comes everyone on the row knows whose final walk it is today, and tomorrow, it could be another.
They’re led out. A walk down the last corridor. To the door that only opens one way for them.
In Texas, inmates are taken to the execution chamber at the Huntsville Unit often known as Walls Unit.
They lie down on the gurney, and before the injection, they are asked if they want to make a final statement.
114 of 545 that is 21%, declined to make any statement. The reasons could be silence, strategy, legal advice, fear, ongoing appeals, or even incapacity.
The rest had something to share
79 percent spoke.
They spoke of family, friends, and the victims’ family.
Some even mentioned their attorneys and the justice system.
Some addressed God. Some revisited the past.
Others simply said goodbye.
Of 545 inmates, 66 around 12% used their final words to proclaim their innocence.
In those last moments, their words carried the weight of knowing it was the end. It revealed a realm of emotions.
In the monotony of the same confined room, what surfaced in that moment were their feelings, as they stood at the very edge of life.
Inside the monotony of a Texas death row cell, where life had long been stripped of color,
The only vividness came from what they felt in their final moments, feelings that may have changed them as a person.
The most dominant emotion expressed was love (34%). Positive emotions such as gratitude (10%), hope (0.6%), and peace (0.6%) were also present, though to a smaller extent. Yet, the significant presence of anger (13%), guilt (12.5%), disgust (9.3%), and fear (16.8%) highlights the negative side of the emotional spectrum as well.
(Anger emotion is prototyped for now)
Within each cell where they spent years lies the color drawn from their final statement click to read. (Anger emotion is prototyped for now)