This week in 1931
“Make it snappy.”
— Charles H. Simpson, convicted of murder, hanging, California.
Executed July 17, 1931
Known as “the Torch Slayer,” Simpson was already a convicted car thief and burglar when he entered Albina Voorhies’s grocery store. Simpson had known Voorhies because she rented the building from his father. Recognizing him, Voorhies turned her back to get him some cookies. That’s when Simpson struck her in the back of the head with a police club. Simpson eventually tied her to a chair, hit her again, and poured coal oil on her clothes, which he then set on fire. Simpson’s nerve faltered—he tried to take Voorhies to the bathroom to put the fire out—but by then the fire had spread. Panicking, Simpson left her in the store to bury the club and burn the clothes he wore.
Simpson could give no reason for his actions other than robbery. He had taken three dollars from the cash register.
This week in 1857
“For God’s sake, don’t do that again.”
— Danforth Hartson, convicted of murder, hanging, California.
Executed July 15, 1857
Hartson (aka Sailor Jim) claimed self-defense in a fight that followed his argument with “estimable citizen” John Burke, whom he knocked to the ground and then shot in the chest. Burke was able to make a full statement, naming Hartson as the murderer, before he died.
Hartson’s last words came after he slipped through the noose and fell through the trap door.
This week in 1998
“For seventeen years the attorney general has been pursuing the wrong man. In time he will come to know this. I don’t want anyone to avenge my death. Instead I want you to stop killing people. God bless.”
— Thomas Martin Thompson, convicted of murder, lethal injection, California.
Executed July 14, 1998
Farmworkers found the body of Ginger Lorraine Fleischli, who had been stabbed and raped. Genetic material implicated Thompson, who had escaped to Mexico. Authorities located him there, made the arrest, and brought him back to the United States. He claimed innocence at the trial, but inmates claimed he had made a full confession. An accomplice, David Leitch, received fifteen years to life on a conviction of second- degree murder.
