About
African American teenager known for surviving a failed execution by electrocution in the United States. After an appeal of his case taken to the U.S. Supreme Court failed, he was executed in 1947 at age 18.
Before Fame
He was a 15 when he was arrested and 16 when found guilty and sentenced to death for the wrongfully convicted murder of Andrew Thomas, a Cajun pharmacy owner in St. Martinville who had once employed him.
Trivia
He had a slight stutter. He also wrote a pamphlet, My Trip to the Chair, in the spring of 1947--after the first failed attempt to electrocute him, and before he was executed the second time.
Family Life
He was born in St. Martinville, Louisiana to Frederick Francis and Louise Taylor. He was the youngest of six boys and seven girls.
Associated With
The portable electric chair, known as "Gruesome Gertie," was found to have been improperly set up by an intoxicated prison guard and inmate from the Louisiana State Penitentiary at Angola. The failed execution and his wrongful conviction were the subject of the 2006 documentary, Willie Francis Must Die Again. The film was narrated by actor Danny Glover and included interviews with Sister Helen Prejean, author of Dead Man Walking,
