Larry Johnson was executed by the State of Florida for the murder of James Hadden
According to court documents Larry Johnson, a Vietnam Veteran, would shoot and kill James Hadden during a armed robbery at a gas station
Larry Johnson would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
Larry Johnson would be executed by way of the electric chair
Larry Johnson Case
Larry Joe Johnson is, by all accounts, a dangerous man; he has killed once and is prone to episodes of confusion and fits of rage. That explains why he must sit in a Florida prison, but not why he is on Death Row.
Though a federal judge has delayed the execution of Johnson, a Vietnam War veteran, his case remains a criminal justice puzzle. He is a man whose mother died when he was 5, whose father died when he was 14, who joined the Navy when he was 24 and served two tours of duty in Vietnam. The horrors he witnessed in war, including the sight of a close friend being blown beyond recognition by a land mine, scarred Johnson for life. He was honorably discharged in 1977 and then left to fend for himself.
Johnson is guilty of having robbed and killed a 67-year-old man two years after his discharge, and no one _ not even his sister _ is suggesting he should go free. The question is whether a government that sent this man to a war that poisoned his mind should now take what is left of his life. As state Supreme Court Justice Gerald Kogan put it: “When this death warrant is executed, Florida will electrocute a man injured and most probably maimed psychologically while serving in his nation’s military in Vietnam and elsewhere.” Why?
Had Johnson’s case been heard more recently than 1979, psychologists would have testified to the known capacity of post-traumatic stress disorder, which has afflicted many people who served this nation in war. The state courts’ current refusal to reconsider his psychological record speaks to the kind of judicial blindness that executive clemency was designed to overcome. If ever there were a case for a governor to commute a death sentence to life in prison, this is it. For some reason, though, Gov. Lawton Chiles is unmoved.
Society will not be served by executing a man whose mind was destroyed in service to his country. Why Chiles can’t see that is troubling.
https://www.tampabay.com/archive/1993/05/06/the-case-of-larry-joe-johnson/
