The Most SHOCKING Death Row Executions of October 2025 – Last Meals & Final Words. (US)
In October 2025, seven death row inmates across six US states were put to death. Each case was marked not only by the crimes that led them there, but by the prisoners final choices, their last meal requests and the last words they spoke. From elaborate feasts to refused meals. From proclamations of innocence to words of remorse or no words at all, these final moments paint a haunting picture.
Let’s walk through every execution in October 2025 in chronological order and examine the chilling details of each condemned inmates last meal and final statement. Roy Lee Ward, Indiana, executed October 10th, 2025. The first execution of October 2025 came early in the month. Roy Lee Ward, a 53-year-old Indiana death row inmate, was executed just after midnight on October 10th at the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City.
Ward had been convicted of the 2001 rape and m*rder of 15-year-old Stacy Payne, a crime so brutal that it ended Indiana’s nearly 15-year hiatus on capital punishment when his death warrant was finally carried out. After more than two decades of legal battles, his execution went forward, making him the state’s second execution of 2025.
In his final hours, Roy Lee Ward indulged in a hefty last meal from a local restaurant, Texas Corral, that resembled a full platter of comfort foods. According to Indiana Department of Correction officials, Ward’s last meal included one hamburger, one steak melt sandwich, an order of French fries, a baked potato with butter, a dozen fried shrimp, a sweet potato, an order of chicken alfredo, and a side of bread sticks.
This enormous spread suggests Ward wasn’t shy about enjoying a final feast. Perhaps he wanted to taste a bit of everything one last time, from surf and turf, shrimp and steak to classic carbs and sweets. It’s a meal as excessive as it sounds. And he took full advantage of the opportunity to eat whatever he desired before facing his fate.
When the moment came for Ward to speak, his actual spoken last words were brief and somewhat cryptic. Prison officials reported that Ward simply said, “Brian’s going to read them.” Those five words were a reference to his spiritual adviser, Deacon Brian Nosbush, who stood in the execution chamber with him.
Ward had prepared a written final statement and chose to have the deacon read it on his behalf. In that statement, which Nos Bush either read aloud or was prepared to, Ward addressed the family of his victim with profound remorse. I hope my execution gives Stacy’s family some peace, Ward statement read, expressing that he wished he could undo his crime and take away the pain he caused.
He admitted, “I hate myself for what I did. I have asked God for forgiveness even though I feel I do not deserve it and said he’d carry the burden of his guilt to the grave. Ward also thanked those who stood by him and spoke of finding religion in prison, hoping to embrace God on what he called his next journey.
In the end, Roy Lee Ward met his death at 12:33 a.m. with a mixture of contrition and acceptance. His final message delivered through another’s voice rather than his own. Ward’s execution would not be the last that week. In fact, just 4 days later, two different states carried out executions on the very same date. One in Florida and one in Missouri only about an hour apart.
Samuel Lee Smithers, Florida, executed October 14th, 2025. 4 days after Roy Ward’s execution, Florida carried out its own. On the evening of October 14th, 2025, Samuel Lee Smithers, aged 72, was put to death by lethal injection at Florida State Prison in Rayford. Smithers was a former church deacon with a dark double life, infamously nicknamed the deacon of death for the 1996 m*rders of two women near Tampa.
Decades earlier, he had lured two sex workers, Christy Cowan and Denise Roach, to a rural Plant City property and brutally k!lled them, beating, stabbing, and drowning his victims before dumping their bodies in a pond. Convicted in 1999, Smither spent over 25 years on death row proclaiming a religious reawakening, yet never escaping the shadow of his gruesome crimes.
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By 2025, at 72 years old, he became the oldest person executed in Florida since capital punishment’s return in the 1970s. His execution marked Florida’s 14th execution of a year, setting a new record for the state. Prior to his execution, Smithers ate a final meal that could rival a family picnic in the deep south. According to prison officials, he requested fried chicken, fried fish, a baked potato, apple pie with vanilla ice cream, and a sweet tea as his last meal.
It’s a classic southern spread, crispy fried meats, comfort carbs, and a touch of sweetness to top it off. One could imagine the 72-year-old k!ller savoring his fried chicken and fish, washing it down with sweet iced tea, and finishing with the all-American dessert of warm apple pie. Alam mode.
This hearty meal would be Smither’s final taste of earthly pleasures. Given his long tenure behind bars, it might have been the most indulgent food he’d seen in decades. When the time came for final statements in the execution chamber, Samuel Smithers had little to say. In fact, he declined to give any last words at all. When asked if he had a final statement, Smithers simply replied, “No, sir, and nothing more.
” With that brief response, the execution proceeded. There were no apologies or proclamations from Smithers in his final moments, only silence. In the witness room were members of the victim’s families and others, but the man known as the deacon of death offered them no closure through words. At 6:15 p.m.
on October 14th, 2025, Samuel Lee Smithers was pronounced dead by lethal injection. Florida had executed a man who once preached from a pulpit, now wordless at the end, leaving behind nothing but the memory of his crimes and a halfeaten last meal. Unbeknownst to Smithers, roughly an hour later on that same evening, another execution was unfolding in a different state.
While Florida officials were closing the curtains on Smither’s execution, Missouri officials were preparing to do the same with Lance Shockley. Lance C. Shockley, Missouri, executed October 14th, 2025. The night of October 14th, 2025 saw two executions almost backto-back. Just about an hour after Smithers was executed in Florida, Lance C.
Shockley was put to death by lethal injection at the Eastern Reception, Diagnostic, and Correctional Center in Bontara, Missouri. Shockley, 48, had been on Missouri’s death row for the 2005 ambush k!lling of a state trooper. Sergeant Carl Dwayne Graham Jr. Prosecutors say Shockley lay in wait near the officer’s home and gunned him down in cold blood with a rifle and shotgun to avoid being arrested for a prior incident.
Convicted of m*rdering a law enforcement officer, Shockley’s case drew heavy attention, not least because he maintained his innocence for years, even as his execution date approached. All appeals failed and Missouri scheduled his execution for 6:00 p.m. on the same date that Smithers met his end in Florida.
Lance Shockley’s last meal was remarkably simple, even Spartan compared to others. Instead of a specially cooked feast, Shockley opted for a selection of snack items from the prison canteen. Peanut butter, three packets of oatmeal, water, and two sports drinks. In Missouri, death row inmates are typically limited to what’s available within the prison, and Shockley’s choice reflected that restriction.
No steak dinner or dessert here, just basic off-the-shelf items. One can picture Shockley stirring his oatmeal and peanut butter together, perhaps creating a makeshift porridge and sipping sports drinks in his cell as the hours counted down. with a humble, almost poignant meal, suggesting either a lack of appetite or the constraints of Missouri’s policies.
This frugal final meal stood in stark contrast to the lavish spread enjoyed by Roy Ward or the fried fair chosen by Smithers earlier that day. Unlike Smithers, Lance Shockley did choose to leave behind some last words, though he did so in writing. He penned a final statement and had it prepared for the execution. When the time came, Shockley quoted a line of scripture as his farewell message.
In a calm written final statement, he offered a verse. So also, you have sorrow now, but I will see you again, and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you. These words which come from the Bible John 16:22 suggest Shockley was expressing faith or hope of reunion likely a message to his loved ones that they would meet again.
Witnesses in the chamber saw Shockley lift his head from the gurnie pillow to look toward the witness room where his family sat, attempting to communicate silently with them just before the execution began. After a brief moment of trying to speak to his family through the glass, Shockley laid back and fell silent.
He gave no audible final speech beyond the written scripture. At 6:13 p.m. on October 14th, 2025, Missouri officials pronounced Lance shockly dead. Barely an hour after Florida had done the same with Smithers. Two different men in two different states were executed on the same night. their final meals and words as divergent as their crimes.
The very next day brought yet another execution, this time in Mississippi. On October 15th, 2025, a man who had spent over 30 years on death row in Mississippi finally met his end, delivering an emotional final statement of faith and regret. Charles Ray Crawford, Mississippi, executed October 15, 2025. Charles Ray Crawford, 59, was executed in Mississippi on October 15th, 2025, just one day after the back-to-back executions in Florida and Missouri.
His death marked Mississippi’s second execution of the year. Crawford had been convicted of a particularly harrowing crime, the 1993 kidnapping, rape, and m*rder of 20-year-old Christy Ray, a community college student in Tippa County. In January 1993, as Christy slept in her family home, Crawford broke in just days before he was due to stand trial for another violent assault, abducted her at knife point, then sexually assaulted and stabbed her to death in a wooded area.
He left a ransom note demanding money, adding a bizarre twist to the tragedy. Crawford was caught and sentenced to death in 1994, but he fought his sentence for three long decades through numerous appeals. By 2025, those appeals had run out. On October 15th at 6 p.m., Crawford was escorted into the execution chamber at Mississippi State Penitentiary, Parchman.
He had been on death row for over 30 years, one of the longest serving death row prisoners in Mississippi’s history. For his last meal, Charles Crawford chose a more classic American fast food style menu. Perhaps a nostalgic choice after decades of prison food. Prison officials reported that Crawford’s final meal included a double cheeseburger with all the fixings, a serving of French fries, peach cobbler for dessert, and chocolate ice cream.
In fact, officials noted that the desserts were served separately as if to ensure he could enjoy the sweet treats on their own. One can easily imagine this meal, a juicy double cheeseburger oozing with cheese, salty fries on the side, and the comfort of a warm peach cobbler topped with cool chocolate ice cream. It sounds like the kind of hearty, indulgent meal many would choose if they had to pick a final dinner.
Crawford, who had eaten countless prison cafeteria meals since the early 1990s, finally got a taste of something different. It was a small bit of comfort on his last day, consumed during his final visits with family and a preacher in the afternoon. It was in his final words, however, that Charles Ray Crawford truly distinguished himself.
Unlike many who declined to speak or offer only a few words, Crawford used his last moments to deliver a heartfelt message of love, faith, and even a sort of counsel. As a lethal injection began, Crawford addressed his own family first. To my family, I love you, he said, looking toward his relatives who witnessed the execution. I’m at peace.
I’ve got God’s peace. I’ll be in heaven,” he continued, expressing a sense of calm and spiritual conviction. Despite the gravity of the moment, Crawford appeared composed and resolute in his faith that he was headed to a better place. He then turned his attention to the family of his victim, acknowledging their longsuffering.
“To the victim’s family, true closure and true peace. You cannot reach that without God,” Crawford said. It was a striking statement. The man who took Christy Ray’s life was preaching that only faith could heal the wounds he caused. As his consciousness began to fade, Crawford’s final words were recorded as, “Thank you, God, for giving me the peace that I have.
” Moments later, at 6:15 p.m., Charles Ray Crawford was pronounced dead. By some accounts, his last words hung in the air. a convicted m*rderer, praying that others find peace, just as he claimed to have found in his final moments. Whether his words provided comfort or not, Christy Ray’s family watched as the man who k!lled their daughter was finally brought to justice.
For them, as Christiey’s mother said, closure was an elusive concept. I have a hole in my heart as big as my heart that will never be closed, she had said prior to the execution. Crawford’s execution did not bring their loved one back, but it ended a 30-year chapter with his last grateful prayer on his lips.
As Mississippi closed the book on Charles Crawford’s case, another state was already preparing its own long delayed execution. 2 days later, Arizona carried out its first execution of a year, ending a 30 plus year saga for a man responsible for a horrific mass m*rder. Richard Kenneth Jerf, Arizona, executed October 17th, 2025.
On the morning of October 17th, 2025, Arizona executed 55-year-old Richard Kenneth Jerf, closing the final chapter on one of the state’s most notorious m*rder cases. Jerf had been convicted of the 1993 massacre of the Luna family in Phoenix, a crime that left four people dead. In a twisted revenge plot against a former friend whom he blamed for a theft, Jerf went to the family’s home and brutally k!lled the parents, Albert and Patricia, their 5-year-old son, Damian, and their teenage daughter, Relle.
The m*rders were exceptionally cruel. Jerf tied up some of his victims and shot or stabbed them and even sexually assaulted the teenage girl before k!lling her. He then attempted to burn the house down to cover his tracks. The sole surviving family member, the adult son, who was Jer’s former coworker, returned home to find the carnage.
Jerf was arrested shortly after and in 1995, he pleaded guilty to all four m*rders, sparing himself a trial, but assuring a death sentence. For three decades, Jerf lived on death row in Arizona. Notably, he did not seek clemency in his final years and even wrote a handwritten apology letter to those he hurt, stating he accepted his punishment.
By 2025, he had long exhausted his appeals and even expressed a belief that he deserved the death penalty for what he had done. Richard Jerf’s last meal was a quintessential slice of American diner cuisine. Prison officials reported that Jerf’s final meal request was a double cheeseburger with lettuce and tomato, a side of onion rings with ketchup, a slice of cherry pie topped with whipped cream, and a 20 oz Pepsi served over ice.
It seems Jer went for a classic burger and soda combo, finishing with a favorite dessert. After decades behind bars, the taste of a loaded cheeseburger and real cherry pie must have been a profound sensation. A final comfort hearkening back to normal life outside prison walls. The details paint the picture. A burger loaded with fresh toppings, crispy onion rings to dip in ketchup, and the sweet tartness of cherry pie cut by a creamy dollop of whipped cream.
He washed it all down with Pepsi on ice, perhaps savoring the fizz one last time. In many ways, it’s a normal meal that any American might enjoy on a Friday night, which makes the context a condemned man’s last supper all the more striking. Jerf got his wish to enjoy these simple pleasures before facing the end. At approxima
tely 10:30 a.m. on October 17th, Jerf was strapped to the gurnie in the Arizona execution chamber in Florence. Needles were placed in his arms. With some difficulty finding a vein, according to witnesses, when asked if he had any final words, Richard Jerf declined. His response was recorded as, “I do not.
” In other words, he had nothing to say before he died. Perhaps Jerf felt his apology had already been given in writing. Or maybe he simply chose silence as his final act. He did not protest. did not make a statement of innocence or remorse in the chamber. He effectively let his earlier actions and let her speak for him.
Witnesses noted that once the lethal drugs flowed, Jerf exhaled a few times as if falling asleep and within minutes he turned blue and lay still. At 10:40 a.m., Richard Jerf was pronounced dead. After 30 plus years, Arizona carried out its sentence. Jerf’s lack of final words, combined with his earlier acceptance of responsibility, stood in quiet contrast to some of the other October executions.
In that silence, there may have been a grim acknowledgement. He had committed unspeakable crimes, and he went to his death without excuse or plea. His last meals remains and that brief I do not were all that was left to mark the end of a life defined by one horrific day in 1993.
As the month went on, one of the most controversial executions occurred on October 23rd in Alabama. This execution was notable not only for the inmate’s vehement claims of innocence up to his final breath, but also because of the unprecedented method used to carry it out. Anthony Todd Boyd, Alabama, executed October 23rd, 2025. By late October, attention turned to Alabama, where Anthony Todd Boyd, 54, was scheduled to die on October 23rd, 2025.
Boyd’s case gained national attention for multiple reasons. First, he insisted right up to and including his final moments that he was wrongly convicted. And second, Alabama planned to execute him using a controversial method, nitrogen gas. Boyd had been convicted in the 1995 m*rder of Gregory Hugley, a man who was abducted over a $200 cocaine debt and gruesomely k!lled, dowsted in gasoline, and set on fire while bound to a chair.
Prosecutors said Boyd was one of the four men involved in this crime, essentially accusing him of helping burn the victim alive. Boyd, however, always maintained, “I didn’t k!ll anybody. I didn’t participate in k!lling anybody. He claimed he was not at the scene of the m*rder at all, but was sent to death row based on conflicting eyewitness testimony and no physical evidence linking him directly to the k!lling.
Despite these assertions and years of appeals, Alabama pressed forward. Uniquely, Boyd had opted for nitrogen hypoxia as his execution method when given a choice in 2018, a method that had only recently been introduced. This would be Alabama’s third execution using nitrogen gas, essentially forcing the inmate to breathe pure nitrogen, causing death by lack of oxygen.
The prospect of this method led to legal challenges and even a descent by US Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor who likened the experience to suffocating like watching somebody drown without water. Nevertheless, the execution was green lit for October 23rd at Holman Correctional Facility. In a startling departure from most other cases, Anthony Boyd refused to eat a special last meal at all.
According to reports, Boyd declined any last meal request. That means on his final day, he ate whatever standard prison fair was served or nothing beyond the ordinary. It’s possible he was fasting in protest or simply too anxious to eat. Boyd’s refusal to indulge in a last meal could be seen as a statement in itself. Perhaps an act of defiance, as if to say the state may take his life, but he wouldn’t grant them the ritual of a last supper.
Or maybe it was rooted in the same reason he chose nitrogen gas. Alabama’s lethal injection protocol had been under scrutiny, and by choosing nitrogen and refusing a last meal, Boyd attempted to assert some control over the manner of his death. We can only speculate. What’s clear is that unlike others who savored burgers or pie one last time, Boyd faced death on an empty stomach by his own choice.
If Boyd’s lack of a final meal was a quiet protest, his final words were anything but quiet. Strapped to the gurnie with an oxygen mask over his face, Anthony Todd Boyd delivered an impassioned last statement that underscored his claims of innocence and condemned the justice system he felt had failed him. He used his last minutes to directly address those present and the world at large.
I just want to say again, I didn’t k!ll anybody. I didn’t participate in k!lling anybody, Boyd declared, his voice steady in the execution chamber. just want everyone to know there is no justice in this state. These words encapsulated Boyd’s long-standing position that Alabama was about to execute an innocent man.
He went on to criticize the courts for dismissing his appeals, saying they all backed each other up rather than consider his evidence. Boyd called the execution process all political. It’s all revenge motivated, insisting there can be no justice in the state under such conditions. As the nitrogen gas began to flow, Boyd delivered a final rallying cry to his supporters and fellow inmates.
I want all my people to keep fighting. You all matter. Let’s get it. This colloquial exhortation, let’s get it, sounded more like a locker room pumpup than a dying declaration. and it showed Boyd’s fiery spirit even in his last breath. Those were his closing words, after which the execution proceeded. Witnesses reported that the nitrogen hypoxia process took longer than lethal injection.
Boyd was observed shaking and gasping in his final moments as the oxygen left his body. It was Alabama’s longest nitrogen execution to date, lasting an estimated 20 minutes from start to finish. Finally, at 6:33 p.m. on October 23rd, 2025, Anthony Todd Boyd was pronounced dead. The third person ever to be executed by nitrogen gas in US history.
His last words, “I didn’t k!ll anybody,” were a defiant echo that lingered, leaving many to debate his case even after his death. Boyd’s execution demonstrated just how contentious capital punishment can be when questions of innocence and new execution methods collide. The tumultuous month of executions concluded with one more case on October 28th back in Florida, a state that had already made headlines with a record number of executions in 2025.
The final execution of October was unusual in its own way, featuring an inmate who welcomed his fate and went to his death without protest. Norman Merl Grim Jr., Florida, executed October 28th, 2025. Rounding out October’s string of executions was Norman Merl Grim Jr. executed in Florida on October 28th, 2025.
Grim, 65, was pronounced dead at 6:14 p.m. after a lethal three drug injection at Florida State Prisoner Stark. His case was the 15th execution carried out by Florida in 2025, a new single-year record for any state. Grim had been on death row for the 1998 rape and m*rder of his nextdoor neighbor, 41-year-old Cynthia Campbell in Santa Rosa County near Pensacola.
The crime was horrific. Campbell was found beaten with a hammer and stabbed 11 times, seven wounds to her heart before being dumped in Pensacola. bay wrapped in trash bags. Physical evidence, including DNA, tied Grim conclusively to the m*rder. What made Grim’s case stand out was his attitude toward his sentence. Unlike most condemned prisoners, Grim waved all his final appeals and even told courts he wanted to be executed rather than spend life in prison.
In fact, at his original trial in 2000, he stopped his lawyers from presenting mitigating evidence, virtually ensuring a death sentence. The Florida Supreme Court noted that Grim’s desire to accept the death penalty made his case unusual. Only about 10% of death row cases involve inmates who don’t fight to stay alive.
By the time Governor Ron DeSantis signed his death warrant in 2025, Grim simply resigned himself to his fate. He became what’s sometimes called a volunteer for execution. On his last day, Norman Grim stuck to a relatively straightforward final meal. Prison officials said that on the morning of his execution day, Grim woke up early around 6:00 a.m.
and later had a meal consisting of fried pork chops and mashed potatoes accompanied by a chocolate milkshake. This menu sounds almost like a classic homestyle dinner one might have at a local diner. The savory comfort of fried pork chops with creamy mashed potatoes, finished off with a sweet, velvety chocolate milkshake.
It’s filling and unpretentious. It’s worth noting that Grim’s meal was not as extravagant as some others, perhaps because Florida’s protocol for last meals is often modest. The state typically limits cost and sources the meal from prison cafeterias. Even so, Grim likely enjoyed this hearty combination.
There’s a subtle poignency in that choice. Pork chops and potatoes could be the kind of simple meal he remembered from better times. In his final hours, Grimm had no visitors and declined a spiritual adviser, so he ate this meal alone, the thick sweetness of the milkshake possibly being the last taste he savored in this life. When Norman Grim was strapped to the gurnie in the execution chamber and given a chance to speak, he also chose a sort of silence very much in line with how he’d conducted himself legally.
asked if he had any final statement before the drugs were administered. Grim replied, “No, sir.” There were no apologies, no dramatic pronouncements, and no scripture or slogans. He simply declined to say anything at all. In a way, this was consistent with Grim’s earlier decision to wave appeals. He was resolved to die and saw no need to add any last words.
Witnesses observed that Grim appeared calm. The lethal injection proceeded at 6:00 p.m. and by 6:14 p.m. it was over. Florida’s executioner had carried out the state’s record- setting 15th execution of the year, and Grim’s lack of final words meant the procedure concluded with an eerie quiet. The only statement to the public came afterward from officials noting that there were no complications during the execution.
Thus, Norman Merl Grim Jr., a man so determined to accept his punishment that he essentially helped pave his own path to the death chamber, died with the same stoic silence he had kept for years. In the gallery, activists banged a gong in protest outside, a now familiar ritual in Florida.
But inside the chamber, Grim’s execution was swift and uneventful. He gave the state nothing beyond no sir. And then he was gone. Over the span of one month, October 2025, these seven men, Roy Lee Ward, Samuel Smithers, Lance Shockley, Charles Crawford, Richard Jerf, Anthony Boyd, and Norman Grim, met their court-ordered deaths.
Each case was separated by miles and years, yet bound by the ritual of the last meal and the gravity of final words. In those small details, we find striking human moments amid the institutional process of execution. Their stories flowed one into the next. Each execution a grim milestone in a record- setting year for capital punishment.
By the end of that month, 35 people had been executed in the US in 2025, and October’s seven contributed to that count in rapid succession. It was a month of both record and rarity. Florida’s executions hit an all-time high. Mississippi employed its rarely used gas chamber. Arizona resumed executions after a long pause, and Alabama’s use of nitrogen gas continued to stoke controversy.
Through it all, the ritual remained. Each man was offered a last meal and a chance to
