NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) – A Tennessee inmate’s final words were “let’s rock” moments before he became the first man executed in the electric chair in that state since 2007, put to death Thursday for shooting two men and slitting their throats during a drug deal decades ago.
Edmund Zagorski, 63, was pronounced dead at 7:26 p.m. Thursday at a Nashville maximum-security prison, officials said.
Asked if he had any last words in the death chamber, the inmate said, “Let’s rock” shortly before the execution was carried out.
A reporter who witnessed the scene said at a post-execution news briefing that Zagorski occasionally smiled while strapped down, just before a sponge was placed on his head and then his face was shrouded. The witnesses said the inmate’s fists then clenched when the electricity was applied and his body appeared to rise. He did not move once the procedure was over.
The reporter said Zagorski’s attorney was nodding, smiling and tapping her heart just before the execution got underway. When asked about her actions, Kelly Henry, said afterward: “I told him when I put my hand over my heart, that was me holding him in my heart.”