Steven Van McHone was executed by the State of North Carolina for a double murder
According to court documents Steven Van McHone was living with his mother and stepfather after getting out of prison. An argument would take place and Steven would fatally shoot Wesley Adams Sr and Mildred Adams
Steven Van McHone was arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
Steven Van McHone was executed by lethal injection on November 11 2005
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When Was Steven Van McHone Executed
Steven Van McHone was executed on November 11 2005
Steven Van McHone Case
Steven Van McHone’s reprieve from death by lethal injection lasted a little more than a day. By 4 p.m. Thursday, the N.C. Supreme Court had vacated a stay granted the day before by a Surry County judge based on the last words of McHone’s mother: “He didn’t mean to do it. Don’t hurt him.” McHone had been sentenced to death for the 1990 shootings of his mother and stepfather. At 9 p.m., the U.S. Supreme Court turned down McHone’s appeal. Gov. Mike Easley denied his clemency petition shortly after 11 p.m.
McHone, 35, was executed at 2 a.m. today at Raleigh’s Central Prison, where death row and the execution chamber are located.Starting at 10 a.m. Thursday, McHone began having the first contact visits with his family and friends since he arrived on death row 14 years ago. At 5 p.m., he sat down to his last meal: a medium-rare Porterhouse steak, steak fries, chocolate cheesecake and a 20-ounce Mountain Dew.
At a prayer service at Pullen Memorial Baptist Church in Raleigh, Rose Clark was among those in attendance before a candlelit procession down to the prison. Clark’s brother Ernest Basden was executed in December 2002 in a murder-for-hire plot. “I want to support the family of Steve,” Clark said. “They are also the victims.”
Those who had agreed to witness the execution included McHone’s half-brother, Wesley Adams Jr., and sister-in-law, Wendy Adams, who live outside Dayton, Ohio. The couple had asked Easley to allow the execution to be carried out. They feared McHone because, after killing his parents, he threatened to kill the couple and their 2-year-old son, Alex. In fact, Wesley Adams Jr. disarmed McHone during a struggle on that June night in 1990.
After a family fishing trip, Mildred Adams, her husband, Wesley Adams Sr., and other relatives returned to the couple’s Surry County home. Their son, McHone, who was 19 at the time, was there and started arguing with his mother about money. McHone had been living at home while on probation for some larceny convictions. Mildred Adams told the others a handgun was missing, and three gunshots were heard a short time later coming from the back yard. McHone had shot Mildred Adams in the back of the head and left her face down and injured in the back yard. McHone then found a shotgun and shot his stepfather, Wesley Adams Sr., inside the house. The shootings ended when Wesley Adams Jr., took away the gun and held McHone down until police arrived.
Mildred Adams uttered her last words to a paramedic who came to her aid after the shootings. The paramedic, Teresa O. Durham of Sparta, did not mention what was said until the late 1990s. McHone’s attorneys, Ken Rose and Cynthia Adcock, convinced Superior Court Judge Anderson Cromer that their client deserved a hearing based on the newly discovered evidence of his mother’s dying declaration. They say it could have persuaded jurors to spare his life. Their argument didn’t persuade the state Supreme Court, however, which sided with state prosecutors seeking to have the death sentence upheld.
Special Deputy Attorney General Valerie B. Spalding questioned why the paramedic did not note Mildred Adams’ words in her report or tell anyone about the statements for years after the killings. Spalding also argued that the mother’s statement would have little impact on a jury because she didn’t know what McHone had done after shooting her.