History Of The Death Penalty In Illinois
By John Dodge
CHICAGO (CBS) -- A botched execution this week in Oklahoma has renewed debate over the death penalty, a practice that was abandoned in Illinois by Gov. George Ryan in 2000.
Before the moratorium, Illinois had executed 360 people, 358 men and two women since 1779 when a man named "Manuel" was convicted of witchcraft and burned at the stake, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.
The first execution after Illinois became a state was John Killduck who was hanged for murder on July 14, 1819.
Illinois used hanging has its method of capital punishment until 1928.
From that point until 1962, criminals were electrocuted.
The state did not kill another person until 1990 when it used lethal injection, which is the method used in the botched execution in Oklahoma.
What happened during the execution of convicted murderer and rapist Clayton Lockett remains unclear.
Witnesses described the man convulsing and clenching his teeth. After about 40 minutes, Lockett was declared dead of a heart attack.
It was the state's first time using a new, three-drug cocktail for an execution.
Since the early 1600s, there have been more than 15,700 executions recorded on American soil. More than half of those deaths were by hanging.
The biggest number of executions in one year happened in 1935, when 149 people were electrocuted, 45 hanged and three sent to the gas chamber.
Virginia has conducted the most executions in U.S. history with 1,385, followed by Texas with 1,221.
The final execution in Illinois happened on March 7, 1999 when the state sent to death a man accused of taking part in the kidnappings, rapes and mutilation murders of 18 women.
Andrew Kokoraleis, 35, sighed three times, licked his lips and appeared to be speaking quietly to himself before he died.
He was sentenced to death for one of the killings -- the 1982 murder of Lorraine Ann Borowski, 21, who was abducted on her way to work at a real estate office. Her mutilated body was found in a cemetery.
