This week in 1984

“I’d like to say to the families of all my victims, I’m sorry for all the grief and heartache I brought to them. If my death brings them any satisfaction, so be it.”

— David Washington, convicted of murder, electric chair, Florida.
Executed July 13, 1984

Even by his own account, former choirboy Washington “had the best breaks in life, all the best opportunities.” But, he told  reporters,“I think my life was just one big mistake. . . . Seemed like everything I touched, I destroyed. Family, wife, friends, everything. I just destroyed.” Washington was sentenced to the electric chair for the stabbing deaths of three people. On the day of his execution, he held his daughter on his knee and said, “I want you to do better.”