James Patterson was executed by the State of Virginia for the murder of Joyce Aldridge
According to court documents James Patterson decided to rob Joyce Aldridge home in order to get money for drugs. When she could only produce a handful of change Patterson would sexually assault the woman before stabbing her to death
James Patterson would be convicted and sentenced to twenty five years in prison for another sexual assault when he would be tied to the Joyce Aldridge murder 11 years later
James Patterson would be convicted and sentenced to death
James Patterson would be executed by lethal injection on March 14 2002
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When Was James Patterson Executed
James Patterson was executed on March 14 2002
James Patterson Case
James Earl Patterson apologized for “the evil I brought into this world” minutes before becoming the first person in the nation executed based on a DNA “cold hit.” Patterson, 35, filed no last-minute appeals of his conviction for the 1987 rape and fatal stabbing of Joyce S. Aldridge, 56, in her Prince George County home, and begged her relatives for forgiveness before he was put to death Thursday night. “My heart goes out to the Aldridge family and all that I put them through,” he said. “I pray they will all find God as I have found him.”
After he was strapped down to the gurney, Patterson lifted his head and stared intently into the witness box, appearing to give a small nod in the direction of his spiritual adviser. “I am at peace now and ready to meet my maker,” Patterson said. “May God bless each and everyone who is here tonight and each one who hears this.” He then rested his head on the gurney as the lethal chemicals began flowing into his thick arms. Patterson was pronounced dead at 9:10 p.m. EST at the Greensville Correctional Center.
Members of the victim’s family witnessed the execution from a separate room. Department of Corrections spokesman Larry Traylor would not identify them or say how many family members were there. Patterson’s mother, father, sister, brother and two daughters visited him earlier in the day, Traylor said. There were no protesters outside the prison.
Patterson was imprisoned for nearly 14 years and would have been released in 2004 without the cold hit. He was implicated in the murder when the state compared DNA samples from the crime with DNA samples in its database of 175,000 felons. A “cold hit” matched the DNA of Patterson, who was in prison for another rape. After the 1999 match, Patterson confessed and pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting and killing Aldridge on Oct. 11, 1987. He told investigators that he forced his way into her home to steal money to buy drugs but became enraged when he learned she only had coins in her purse. He raped her and stabbed her 17 times. “The penalty fit the crime,” Patterson said last week in a telephone interview from death row. “I was responsible and I want to pay the ultimate price.”
Of the 37 other states with the death penalty, no executions have been based on a cold hit, an Associated Press survey found. Virginia became the first state to execute a person whose conviction was based on DNA evidence when Timothy W. Spencer went to the electric chair in 1993 for a series of stranglings in Richmond and Arlington. The execution is the first in Virginia this year and the 84th in the state since the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the death penalty to be reinstated in 1976.
