"I Don't Know Why ..."

As Edward Honeycutt, a young Negro, was strapped in Louisiana's portable electric chair last week, a young couple named Mr. & Mrs. George Byrd sat among the spectators by special arrangement with St. Landry Parish Sheriff Clayton Guilbeau. The death chair had been set up in a jury room at the parish courthouse in Opelousas, and the Byrds were there because Honeycutt had been convicted of raping Mrs. Byrd in the presence of two of her children.

After the first charge, as Honeycutt's 6 ft. 3 in. frame sagged limply in the chair, Mrs. Byrd said: "I'm not nervous. I don't know why I wanted to see it. I just can't explain it." Another surge of electricity stiffened Honeycutt's body and he was dead.

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