Eddie Trice was executed by the State of Oklahoma for the murder of Ernestine Jones
According to court documents Eddie Trice would break into the home of eighty four year old Ernestine Jones. The elderly woman would be sexually assaulted and beaten to death with a pair of nunchucks. Trice would take money from the home and flee
Eddie Trice would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
Eddie Trice would be executed on January 9 2001 by lethal injection
Eddie Trice Photos
Eddie Trice FAQ
When Was Eddie Trice Executed
Eddie Trice was executed on January 9 2001
Eddie Trice Case
A man convicted of raping and killing an elderly Oklahoma City woman in a $500 robbery was scheduled to be executed Tuesday evening. Eddie Leroy Trice, 48, was the first of eight inmates to face the executioner in 25 days at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester. Trice was to receive a lethal does of drugs at 9 p.m. in the penitentiary’s death row, called the H Unit.
He was convicted of the Feb. 14, 1987, murder of Ernestine Jones in her northeast Oklahoma City home. He also severely beat Jones’ 63-year-old mentally retarded son, Emanuel, who attempted to come to his mother’s aid. Authorities said Trice entered Jones’ home just after midnight through a bedroom window and beat Jones to death with a martial arts weapon, called nunchakus, and stole about $500. Jones’ jaw, cheekbones, ribs and fingers were broken, and she received blows to the head and suffered bruises to the heart and lungs. Trice’s roommate alerted police after Trice came home with a lot of money and claimed to have beaten a homosexual with his nunchakus. Trice later told police he had been drinking wine and taking PCP that night. Trice was arrested four days later, and police said he later confessed. He was convicted and sentenced to death in June 1987.
Attorney General Drew Edmondson said just before the execution that no appeals were pending on Trice’s behalf. “Everything at this point in time is green and the execution is expected to go forward,” he said. Four of Jones’ family members were expected to witness the execution, Edmondson said, including daughter Velma Harris, son Elmer Jones, grandson Charles Jones and great-grandson Ronald Harris. The family issued a statement thanking the police, the courts and media for their help. Emanuel Jones has since died and is buried next to his mother, the family said. “Ernestine was a hard worker who stuck with us,” the family said. “She was a mother of 11 who always kept a home.”
Corrections Department spokesman Jerry Massie said two of Trice’s brothers, a sister-in-law, an attorney, an investigator and two spiritual advisers were to witness on his behalf. Just before the execution, death penalty opponents gathered outside the prison gates to pray for Jones’, her family and for Trice. Members of the Homicide Survivors Support Group set up displays of victims near the prayer vigil.
Trice would be the 31st inmate executed in Oklahoma since Oklahoma restarted the death penalty and executed the first man by lethal injection in 1990. He would be the 114th man executed in the state. Wanda Jean Allen, convicted in the 1988 shooting death of Gloria Leathers, was scheduled to face the executioner on Thursday. She would be the first woman executed in Oklahoma since statehood.
Jurors ruled that Trice’s crime warranted the death penalty because it met four of eight aggravating circumstances. Trice had a previous felony conviction involving the use of threat of violence and knowingly created a great risk of death to more than one person during the crime.
