1991: Pee Wee Gaskins Executed for a Murder Committed Behind Bars
Donald Henry Gaskins Jr., known as Pee Wee Gaskins, was executed in the electric chair at Broad River Correctional Institution in South Carolina at 1:10 a.m. on 6 September 1991, aged 58. A serial killer confirmed to have murdered at least thirteen people between 1970 and 1975, including six teenagers and a two-year-old, he had originally been sentenced to death in 1976 for one of eight bodies found buried near his home in Prospect, South Carolina. That sentence was overturned, and he pleaded guilty to nine murders in exchange for life imprisonment.
His second death sentence came after he murdered a fellow death row inmate, Rudolph Tyner, using C4 explosive while incarcerated at Central Correctional Institution in Columbia. Hours before his execution, Gaskins attempted suicide by slitting his wrists. He claimed to have killed 110 people, a figure widely dismissed by law enforcement and journalists as a bid for notoriety.
His last words were: ‘I’ll let my lawyers talk for me. I’m ready to go.’
