1996: Roberto Giron and Pedro Castillo, televised shootings
September 13th, 2018 Headsman
Roberto Giron and Pedro Castillo, peasants who raped and murdered a four-year-old girl, were shot at the Guatemalan town of Escuintla on September 13, 1996.
The executions — Guatemala’s first juridical shootings since 1983, although civil war death squads had ravaged the country in the meanwhile — were filmed by the press and televised, and the tape told an troubling tale: both men survived the initial volley and after paunchy doctors hastily conferred by the gasping doomed men, were icily finished off by the squad commander’s pistol.
Warning: Mature Content. This is a snuff film. A slightly longer cut of the same reel can be found here.
Thanks to this ghastly debacle, Guatemala changed its execution method to lethal injection — an application of which was also televised in 2000.
On this day..
- 1951: Robert Dobie Smith, suicide by Pierrepoint - 2020
- 1775: Huttenkloas - 2019
- 1569: Gaspard de Coligny, in effigy - 2017
- 1862: William Robert Taylor, angry tenant - 2016
- 1567: Four Anabaptists in Antwerp, after torture - 2015
- 1418: Beatrice di Tenda - 2014
- 1896: Chief Uwini of the Maholi - 2013
- 1944: Noor Inayat Khan, SOE operative - 2012
- 1916: Mary the Elephant - 2011
- 1962: Mack Merrill Rivenburgh cheats the executioner - 2010
- 1847: The San Patricios - 2009
- 1946: Amon Göth, Schindler's List villain - 2008
Entry Filed under: 20th Century,Botched Executions,Capital Punishment,Common Criminals,Crime,Death Penalty,Execution,Guatemala,Mature Content,Milestones,Murder,Public Executions,Rape,Shot
Tags: 1990s, 1996, escuintla, pedro castillo, roberto giron, september 13, television
