Christopher Vialva says race played a central role in landing him on death row.
He was pronounced dead at 6.46pm after US Department of Justice officials injected him with pentobarbital, a barbiturate, at the execution chamber in Terre Haute, Indiana, according to a reporter serving as a media witness. It is the most executions within a single year by the US government since at least 1927, the oldest year of records in a database compiled by the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington.
At Vialva’s trial in 2000, a jury of 11 white people and one black person found him and a black accomplice, Brandon Bernard, guilty of carjacking and murder.According to court records, Vialva and his accomplices were looking for someone to rob when they found Todd Bagley using a payphone at a store, and he agreed to give them a ride in his car.
Eventually, Vialva parked the car in an isolated part of Fort Hood, opened the trunk and shot both Bagleys in the head, killing Todd and rendering Stacie unconscious.