Walter Holmes
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Walter Holmes (February 3, 1900 – April 29, 1932) was a murderer who was executed in Kentucky's electric chair. His death drew attention since he had violently resisted his execution. He also stabbed a prison guard with a homemade knife the day before his execution.
Holmes, a black man originally from Chicago, Illinois,[1] murdered a farmer, 55-year-old Thomas Tillery, on April 3, 1931, by shooting him with two accomplices, Walter Dewberry and Charles Rodgers. The trio had been on a crime spree across Kentucky committing a series of robberies and assaults in Louisville, Fulton County, and some sections of southern Illinois.[2] When first apprehended, they tried to claim that the three of them committed a robbery while an unknown man fired the shot that murdered Tillery, but no such man was ever found, and only Holmes, Rodgers, and Dewberry went to court.[3]
Trial
The trial began on April 28, 1931, amid great racial tension. Dewberry's black attorney was beaten by a mob that felt angered by Dewberry's choice of a black civil rights attorney over a white court-appointed attorney; Dewberry's attorney requested a change of venue because of the violent atmosphere, but this was denied,[4] and on May 3, 1931, Holmes, Dewberry, and Rodgers all received death sentences for their crimes.[5]
The executions of the three convicts were scheduled for April 29, 1932, but Dewberry was given a stay of execution, so on that date, only Holmes and Rodgers were executed.[6][7]