A man who was on death row in Texas is the sole reason why other inmates in the state are no longer offered a final meal request.

Russell Brewer, 44, was sentenced to death for the brutal 1998 killing of James Byrd Jr., a Black man who was tortured and then chained by his ankles to the back of a pickup truck and dragged for three miles.

According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice: "Brewer and his co-defendants then dragged the victim to his death, leaving his decapitated and dismembered body to be found the following day by citizens and law enforcement officials," as cited by The Mirror.

The crime shocked the nation and led to sweeping hate crime legislation. Brewer and John William King were convicted of capital murder and sent to death row, becoming the first white men in Texas to receive the death penalty for killing a Black man.

Their actions were partly tied to affiliations with white supremacist groups like the Confederate Knights of America and the Ku Klux Klan, per the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

Shawn Allen Berry, also involved in the crime, received a life sentence.

Before his execution on September 21, 2011, Brewer made headlines with an outrageous final meal request.

It included two chicken fried steaks, fried okra with ketchup, a cheese omelet with ground beef, jalapenos, and bell peppers.

He added a triple-meat bacon cheeseburger, three fajitas with all the trimmings, one pound of barbecue, a half loaf of white bread, a meat lover’s pizza, one pint of vanilla ice cream, a slab of peanut butter fudge with crushed peanuts, and three root beers.

But what really rubbed law officials up the wrong way was that they obliged the request, all for Brewer to refuse to eat a single bite.

When asked if he had any final words, Brewer replied: "No. I have no final statement," and was pronounced dead at 6:21PM via lethal injection.

That stunt infuriated lawmakers.

Texas Senator John Whitmire immediately took action, writing to the executive director of the Texas Criminal Justice Division: "Enough is enough... it is extremely inappropriate to give a person sentenced to death such a privilege. It's a privilege which the perpetrator did not provide to their victim," per the BBC.

His words were echoed again: "It is extremely inappropriate to give a person sentenced to death such a privilege."

The executive director agreed. The 87-year-old tradition of granting final meal requests was permanently scrapped. From that point forward, no death row inmate in Texas would be granted a last meal of their choosing.

For the family of James Byrd Jr., Brewer’s execution marked a moment of painful closure.

Clara Taylor, Byrd’s sister, said: "Hopefully, today we have been reminded that racial hatred and prejudice can lead to tragic consequences for both the victim and his family, as well as the perpetrator and his family. Our sincere condolences to the family of Lawrence Brewer."

The victim’s two sisters and a niece called the execution “the next step to total justice for James,” as cited by Reuters.

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A death row inmate had consumed a 29,000-calorie final meal before his execution.

On June 2012, Gary Carl Simmons Jr received a lethal injection at the Mississippi State Penitentiary for the tragic murder of Jeffrey Wolfe.

The former grocery store butcher used his meat carving knives to slaughter his 21-year-old victim before dispersing his remains in an alligator-infested bayou in 1996.

Sixteen years after his gruesome crime, Simmons Jr chomped down on a mammoth final meal before facing the consequences of his actions.

According to Gulf Live, the inmate requested "one Pizza Hut medium Super Supreme Deep Dish pizza, double portion, with mushrooms, onions, jalapeño peppers, and pepperoni; pizza, regular portion, with three cheeses, olives, bell pepper, tomato, garlic, and Italian sausage; 10 8-oz".

He also asked for "packs of Parmesan cheese; 10 8-oz. packs of ranch dressing; one family-size pack of Doritos nacho cheese flavor; 8 oz. jalapeño nacho cheese; 4 oz. sliced jalapeños; two large strawberry shakes; two 20-oz".

It didn't end there as he then ordered "cherry Cokes; one super-size order of McDonald's fries with extra ketchup and mayonnaise; and two pints of strawberry ice cream" to complete his final meal.

Simmons was killed by lethal injection at 6 PM on June 20, 2012. According to Claim Your Innocence, 90 minutes before the execution, the Department of Corrections claimed he had eaten about half his meal and had tried a bit of everything apart from the chips.

It has not been reported if he managed to finish the gigantic feast before he was killed.

As stated in records from the Mississippi Supreme Court, Wolfe and his girlfriend, Charlene Leaser, drove from Houston to Mississippi to collect a drug debt of between $12,000 and $20,000 owed by Simmons and his accomplice, Timothy Milano, per the Daily Mail.

However, when the couple got to the inmate's house, he and his accomplice revealed that they did not have the drugs or the money. An argument soon exploded which concluded in Milano fatally shooting Wolfe with a .22-caliber rifle.

Wolfe's girlfriend was then hog-tied and latched in a foot locker by Simmons, who proceeded to rape her. Court documents said he told her that "her life depended on how well she performed sexually," as cited by the outlet.

Later, he put Charlene in the box and went to the bathroom where he used his knives from work to gruesomely butchered Wolfe's body in the bathtub.

The woman was able to escape from the foot locker and fled to a neighbor's house where she called the police. Simmons was then sentenced and convicted in August 1997 for kidnapping, rape, and capital murder. He was sentenced to death.

For his last words, while strapped to the gurney, Simmons said: "I’ve been blessed to be loved by some good people, by some amazing people. I thank them for their support. Now, let’s get it on so these people can go home. That’s it."

Featured image credit: Aaron Bastin / Alamy

A South Carolina death row inmate's final meal before being executed by firing squad has been revealed.

Stephen Bryant, a 44-year-old convicted killer, was put to death on Friday (November 14), marking the state’s third use of the controversial method this year alone.

Bryant was pronounced dead at 6:05PM after three prison officers, each armed with live ammunition, opened fire.

He made no final statement and showed no emotion as he looked at the witnesses behind bulletproof glass. Seconds later, shots rang out, and the red bullseye target pinned to his chest flew forward.

Onlookers shared that he took a few shallow breaths before a final spasm, and a doctor confirmed his death a little over a minute later.

Final Meal Before Execution

Bryant becomes the 50th person executed in South Carolina since the state reinstated the death penalty four decades ago and the 43rd executed in the US this year.

Before facing the firing squad, he requested a final meal: spicy mixed seafood stir-fry, fried fish over rice, egg rolls, stuffed shrimp, two candy bars, and German chocolate cake, per The New York Post.

His attorney, Bo King, revealed harrowing details about Bryant’s life, pointing to a genetic disorder, brain damage caused by his mother’s substance abuse, and years of physical and sexual abuse from relatives.

“Tonight, South Carolina gave Mr Bryant his final wounds in a lifetime of suffering,” King said in a statement after the execution.

“Mr Bryant’s impairments left him unable to endure the tormenting memories of his childhood. When these traumas pushed him to mental collapse, he pleaded for professional help. He was refused care by our broken mental health system because he could not afford the fee of $75," they added.

The lawyer described the death row inmate as a man who had found a kind of peace before his death. “We will remember his unlikely friendships, his fierce protectiveness, and his love for nature, the water, and the world.”

South Carolina’s governor denied clemency, and the state’s supreme court rejected appeals claiming the original sentencing had failed to properly consider Bryant’s brain damage.

The attorney general’s office painted a different picture, calling Bryant “methodical” and “cunning,” citing the “gratuitous infliction of horror” in his crimes.

Prosecutors said the prisoner tortured one victim, Willard “TJ” Tietjen, burning his eyes with cigarettes and smearing taunting messages in blood, AP News reported.

He also fatally shot two other men, one before and one after Tietjen, by pulling over to let them urinate before shooting them in the back.

Growing Controversy Around The Firing Squad

Bryant’s execution came as South Carolina ramped up its use of capital punishment after a 13-year hiatus caused by the inability to obtain lethal injection drugs.

Since resuming executions in 2024, the state has executed seven inmates: four by lethal injection and three by firing squad.

The method has sparked renewed national outrage. Human rights groups have slammed it as “barbaric,” while state officials defend it as quick and humane.

The Rev. Hillary Taylor of South Carolinians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty condemned the choice inmates are now forced to make.

“Do you choose being poisoned to death in a way that is akin to waterboarding, do you get cooked to death by electrocution, or do you get your heart blown out of your chest by a firing squad?” she said.

South Carolina now joins Utah as the only two states to have executed three people by firing squad in the modern era. Idaho is preparing to make it its primary method, while the option remains legal in Mississippi and Oklahoma.

Featured image credit: Marcia Straub / Getty

Death row inmates in Texas no longer get a final meal before their execution - and it's down to a white supremacist's shocking request.

For many years, last meals have been a customary ritual before prisoners have their death sentence carried out.

Some convicts' requests have been pretty specific, like when John Wayne Gacy asked for 12 fried shrimp, a bucket of original recipe KFC, french fries, and a pound of strawberries. Others have been simple, like Ted Bundy requesting steak and eggs.

However, one inmate named Lawrence Russell Brewer - who was a white supremacist - requested an outrageous special meal before his death, and this led to Texas abolishing last meals for other death row inmates.

Brewer, 44, was imprisoned on June 7, 1998, along with John William King and Shawn Allen Berry for murdering a Black man named James Byrd Jr.

The group of men killed Byrd by torturing him before chaining him by the ankles to the back of a pickup truck and dragging him behind it for three miles, per The Mirror.

According to the Texas Department of Criminal Justice: "Brewer and his co-defendants then dragged the victim to his death, leaving his decapitated and dismembered body to be found the following day by citizens and law enforcement officials," as cited by the outlet.

Brewer and King were convicted of capital murder and sent to death row, making them the first white men to receive the death penalty for killing a Black man in Texas, causing the state to introduce new laws around hate crimes. Meanwhile, Berry received a life sentence for his involvement in the crime.

It was contended in court that the three men carried out their disturbing criminal act "in part, due to their racially separatist affiliation with the Confederate Knights of America and the Ku Klux Klan," per the Texas Department of Criminal Justice. 

Before his execution, Brewer took full advantage of the last meal request, asking for a wild concoction of foods, including chicken steaks, fried okra with ketchup, and a cheese omelet with ground beef, jalapenos, and bell peppers.

It didn't end there as he also requested a triple-meat bacon cheeseburger, three fajitas with all the trimmings, one pound of barbecue and a half loaf of white bread, pizza meat lover's special, one pint of vanilla ice cream; a slab of peanut butter fudge, and three root beers.

The guards did their best to fulfill Brewer's final meal list but, when the prisoner was presented with it, he refused to eat a single mouthful, saying that he wasn't hungry.

Brewer's refusal resulted in Texan Senator John Whitmire ending the 87-year-old tradition, meaning from that day forward, nobody on death row in Texas has had a last meal request granted.

He wrote a letter to the executive director of the Texas Criminal Justice Division, stating: "Enough is enough...it is extremely inappropriate to give a person sentenced to death such a privilege. It's a privilege which the perpetrator did not provide to their victim," per the BBC.

He called the last meal request an "extremely inappropriate" privilege, adding: "One which the perpetrator did not provide to their victim."

After spending 12 years of his life on death row, Brewer was executed via lethal injection on September 21, 2011. Asked if he had any final words, he replied: "No. I have no final statement," and was pronounced dead at 6.21PM.

The victim's two sisters and a niece called the execution "the next step to total justice for James," as cited by Reuters.

"Hopefully, today we have been reminded that racial hatred and prejudice can lead to tragic consequences for both the victim and his family, as well as the perpetrator and his family," Clara Taylor, Byrd's sister, said. "Our sincere condolences to the family of Lawrence Brewer."

Featured image credit: Buck Kelly / Getty