This Week in Texas Prison History

January 12: 

1955 - Huntsville Unit (Walls) - Donald Hawkins Brown, convicted torch killer of a Dallas finance company employee, went to the electric chair Wednesday after making a  plea for an end to capital punishment. Brown expressed regret that Dist. Atty. Henry Wade of Dallas was not present to see him executed for the slaying in 1952 of Edwin Campbell. "I don't see Mr. Wade or any of the prosecutors here," Brown said with a smile as he was prepared for the chair. Then he handed Don Reid, newspaperman, a note in which he said capital punishment made martyrs of psychopaths and offered them "an adventure." He entered the death chamber at 12:02 a.m., received the first charge at 12:04 a.m. and was pronounced officially dead at 12:06 a.m. Earlier he had taken it hard the news that the state board of pardons and paroles had refused clemency in his case. He said the Constitution wasn't any good, that Texas justice was not to his liking, that he was innocent, that he didn't want a "last meal," and that he wanted the District Attorney, prosecutors, detectives and jurors present for his execution. "You still maintain that you're not guilty?" Reid asked. "I certainly do." He was convicted of brutally shooting Campbell, a bill collector, three times, saturating the body with gasoline and setting it afire in the victim's car. (AP Dallas Morning News. January 12, 1955)