Former Talk Show Host Weds Killer : Bride Wore White, Groom Prison Blue

The honeymoon was over before it started for condemned killer James Briley, who embraced his bride through the bars of a prison cell where the two were married--and then kissed her goodby.

The couple won’t have a honeymoon because Virginia forbids conjugal visits for prisoners. And Briley faces execution in three weeks.

But Evangeline Redding Briley, 44, of Halifax, N.C., said she is a happy newlywed nonetheless. “We touched through the bars,” she said. “I even got a few kisses.”

Briley, 28, exchanged vows Thursday with the divorced mother of four in a 10-minute ceremony just paces away from the electric chair.

As part of her vows Redding, a former radio talk show host, said: “Tomorrow, I will walk alone, but I will walk proudly as a woman. I will wear your love and your name. How beautiful your name and love becomes me.”

The bride wore a white linen suit and the groom wore fresh prison denims. The wedding was scheduled for 5 p.m. but the groom was left waiting at the altar--in his cell--while prison authorities strip-searched the bride and Briley’s father, James Sr.

Redding, who began writing Briley after his brother Linwood was executed last Oct. 12, proposed the marriage. They had four non-contact visits before the wedding.

Briley, his brother and four other condemned killers escaped last May 31 from the Mecklenburg Correctional Center in the biggest Death Row breakout in U.S. history. The Briley brothers, blamed for 12 murders in Richmond in 1979, remained free the longest--19 days--before they were recaptured in Philadelphia.

Briley is scheduled for execution April 18.