Revisiting the Execution of Willie Francis: Race, Murder and the Search for Justice

Reviewed: The Execution of Willie Francis: Race, Murder and the Search for Justice in the American South

by Gilbert King Basic Civitas Books, 2008, $26 cloth, 324 pages

They called the Louisiana electric chair Gruesome Gertie and in her years of service to the state, no case was more notorious than that of long-forgotten Willie Francis. A 16-year-old teen at the time of his 1945 arrest, Francis was barely literate, the youngest of 13 children in a desperately poor, devoutly Roman Catholic, African American family.

The story begins in November, 1944 with the murder of 53- year-old Andrew Thomas, the well-liked owner of Thomas's Drug Store in the pastoral Cajun town of St. Martinville, Louisiana. Thomas, who was white, was hit by five shots fired at close range. Theories of who might have killed him were abundant. The lifelong bachelor and purported Don Juan was suspected of numerous romantic liaisons with married women, but after a nine-month investigation, all leads had run cold.

That changed in August 3, 1945 when police in Port Arthur, Texas, 150 miles from St. Martinville, happened upon Willie Francis who was there visiting his sister. Francis was carrying a large valise and the cops, on the lookout for drug traffickers, took Francis into custody for questioning.

In short order, Francis convinced his interrogators that he was not a narcotics dealer. Nevertheless, the cops noted that he stuttered -- a mannerism they determined indicated guilt -- and proceeded to ask him about his involvement in numerous robberies and assaults in the Port Arthur area.

King reports that police accounts reveal a startling -- maybe even unbelievable -- turn of events. According to Port Arthur Chief of Police Claude W. Goldsmith, "who did not keep any notes or records of the interrogation, Willie confessed to the St. Martinville murder [of Thomas] in a matter of minutes." What's more, when they inspected Francis' wallet they found an ID bearing the name of Andrew Thomas.

Francis' written statement, replete with spelling errors, admits that he stole a .38 pistol for the planned murder. His statement further concedes that he took Thomas' wallet, containing $4, along with a gold watch which he later pawned. No counsel was present at the time of this alleged confession.

A month later Francis was indicted by a grand jury and in no-time flat a trial was scheduled. A jury of twelve white men -- clearly not Francis' peers -- was selected. As testimony unfolded the jurors learned that there was no forensic evidence linking Francis to the crime. "Also missing," King writes, "were the murder weapon and bullets that had been recovered from the scene." Both had been lost in transit to the FBI Crime Lab. Worse, King writes, "no fingerprints had been lifted from the gun. Without the alleged murder weapon or the wrist watch as evidence, the bulk of the District Attorney's case rested exclusively on confessions obtained by police while the teenaged Willie Francis was in custody and without legal counsel." Later, attorneys and journalists reviewing the trial transcript dubbed the proceedings "a farce and travesty."

Nonetheless, Francis was found guilty and sentenced to die in Gruesome Gertie.

His executioners were Angola Prison captain Ephie Foster and prisoner Vincent Venezia. Both men were charged with transporting the contraption to St. Martinville and insuring Francis' death by electrocution. They had done this before and ostensibly knew how to proceed. Indeed, they were so relaxed that they opted for a night of serious drinking in the hours immediately before the scheduled execution.

Eyewitnesses report that the pair were visibly drunk when they arrived at the jail the following morning. Still, they did the state's bidding and strapped Francis into the chair before applying the current.