Mickey Davidson was executed by the State of Virginia for the murder of his wife and two stepdaughters
According to court documents Mickey Davidson and his wife Doris Jane Davidson relationship was falling apart and when she decided to go back to her ex husband Mickey snapped. Mickey would murder Doris Jane Davidson and her two daughters Mamie Darnell Clatterbuck and Tammy Lynn Clatterbuck with a crowbar
Mickey Davidson would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
Mickey Davidson would be executed by lethal injection on October 19 1995
Mickey Davidson Photos
Mickey Davidson Case
Mickey Wayne Davidson’s first confession came just after dawn on a warm June morning. Bursting in on a brother-in-law, smelling of liquor, Davidson blurted out, “I’ve got bad troubles,” that he had “killed all three of them.”
Tonight, at 9:41 p.m., after a 22-minute delay before the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a final appeal, the 38-year-old Smyth County man was put to death for the crime behind that 1990 confession. As he had later told sheriff’s deputies, he had taken a crowbar and slain his wife and two stepdaughters in a spasm of violence in their living room.
For five years, Davidson had waived legal attempts to prolong his life, maintaining that he deserved to die. He wavered once, three days before a 1993 execution date, launching a round of court proceedings. But tonight, he signed a statement to Gov. George Allen (R) disavowing further appeals by anti-death penalty lawyers
His last utterance was: “I’ll say my last words to the Lord. I guess that’s all that really matters,” witnesses said.
Davidson’s death by lethal injection marked the fourth time this year that Virginia has carried out an execution. Some had expected the pace of executions to be brisk this fall, with nine set for three months, including three in just four days in October.
But through a combination of legal appeals and federally ordered stays, capital punishment has been meted now only twice. Four men have been spared, at least temporarily, and three still do not know their fate. The grim legal accounting reflects the continued uncertainty in the administration of the death penalty, even as the nation — with Virginia at the forefront — moves to swifter, tougher justice.
“There have been a number of states where governors have accelerated the process of signing death warrants,” said Richard C. Dieter, executive director of the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center. “But still the number of executions have remained fairly constant. . . . Cases still have to go through the complex process of state and federal appeals, and they should. Sometimes mistakes are made.”
Davidson pleaded guilty to murdering his wife, Doris Jane Davidson, 36, and her two daughters, Mamie Darnell Clatterbuck, 14, and Tammy Lynn Clatterbuck, 13. The day after the June 13, 1990, killings, he wrote that the victims were about to return to the girls’ father after seeking child support.
“I just couldn’t stand to see her go back. I just couldn’t stand to see them go back,” Davidson said in a police confession. “So about 10 or 11 a.m. yesterday . . . I just took a crowbar and killed them.”
He was the 28th inmate executed in Virginia since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976. Virginia, which has 56 inmates on death row, has put more people to death than any state but Florida and Texas.
Lawyers for the Virginia Capital Representation Resource Center worked throughout the day today to intervene on behalf of Davidson’s second cousin. But U.S. District and Appeals courts rejected his appeals that Davidson was mentally incompetent. Allen also declined to act on the relative’s petition for a reprieve, although he stayed the execution briefly to allow the U.S. Supreme Court to uphold the lower judgments
“He was very calm,” volunteer prison minister Bobby B. West said afterward. “He made his peace with God, and God has forgiven him . . . He’s been sorry for this crime since the day it was committed.”
Between Sept. 20 and Dec. 14, eight other execution dates had been set. So far, the only man put to death was Dennis W. Stockton, 44, who was convicted of a murder for hire of a teenager in 1978 and executed Sept. 27.
Three of the four other men who were to have been executed this month have received stays.
A Virginia law that took effect July 1 set new deadlines for habeas corpus appeals, cut out a stage of the process and required local courts to set execution dates within 70 days after an inmate’s petition has been rejected by the Virginia Supreme Court or the federal appeals court.
Attorney General James S. Gilmore III (R) has said the changes will shorten the time from sentencing to execution by two to three years at least, in a process that now averages eight years nationally
