HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) – A man who orchestrated one of the most gruesome hate crimes in U.S. history was executed by lethal injection on Wednesday night.
John William King was convicted in the June 1998 dragging death of James Byrd Jr., a black man from East Texas.
The 44-year-old King, who is white and an avowed racist, was put on death row for chaining Byrd to the back of a truck and dragging his body along a secluded road outside Jasper, Texas. Prosecutors said Byrd was targeted because he was black. The murder is widely considered one of the most brutal hate crimes in U.S. history.
The hate crime put a national spotlight on Jasper, which was branded with a racist stigma it has tried to shake off ever since.
King is the second man executed in the case. Russell Brewer was executed in 2011. A third man received a life sentence.
