The U.S. government has executed a man who kidnapped and raped a 16-year-old Texas girl before dousing her with gasoline and burying her alive.
Orlando Hall was convicted for his role in the 1994 horrific kidnapping, rape, and murder of the 16-year-old sister of two Texas drug dealers he suspected had stolen money from him.
Hall was put to death at 11.47pm on Thursday, local time, via lethal injection at the federal prison in Terre Haute, Indiana.
The victim, Lisa Rene was abducted in 1994 from her apartment by five men, including Hall, who had gone there to confront her brothers. When they found her instead, the gang of marijuana traffickers took her at gunpoint to Arkansas where she was raped, beaten, doused with gasoline before being buried alive.
A victim impact statement on behalf of Lisa’s family was issued following the execution, 26 years after her tragic death.
“Today marks the end of a very long and painful chapter in our lives,” Pearl Rene said. “My family and I are very relieved that this is over.”
Hall was found guilty by an all-white jury, which lawyers cited concerns over Hall, who was Black, and claimed that it was the result of racial discrimination after he was sentenced on the recommendation of the all-white jury.
The execution came after the US Supreme Court overturned a previous ruling that blocked it on the grounds of method. The court also denied motions to halt the execution in three other cases filed by Hall’s lawyers.
Hall is the eighth federal inmate put to death this year under the Donald Trump administration after a nearly two-decade hiatus.
