Willie Francis (January 12, 1929 – May 9, 1947) is best known for being the first recipient of a failed execution by electrocution in the United States. He was a black juvenile offender sentenced to death by electrocution by the state of Louisiana in 1945 (at age 16) for murdering Andrew Thomas, a Cajun pharmacy owner in St. Martinville who had once employed him.
Read more about Willie Francis: Arrest and Trial, Execution, Appeal, and Second Execution, Documentary
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“Charlie don’t surf!”
—John Milius, U.S. screenwriter, Francis Ford Coppola (b. 1939)