Murderer Dies in Virginia Electric Chair

A man was executed in Virginia’s electric chair Thursday night for raping and hacking to death a woman in 1980.

Edward B. Fitzgerald Sr., 34, was pronounced dead at 11:12 p.m at the Greensville Correctional Center, said Wayne Brown, the prison’s operations officer.

Fitzgerald had visited with relatives, lawyers and a journalist in his last hours.

“I told my lawyers I didn’t want them to even look at filing any legal appeal unless it was something that was going to work,” Fitzgerald said.

He said he did not want to walk to the electric chair in uncertainty while awaiting a court’s response to a long-shot appeal.

Gov. L. Douglas Wilder refused to grant clemency Tuesday. Fitzgerald’s lawyer, Barry Weinstein, who works for a coalition that defends Death Row inmates, had said he was still looking for evidence that might persuade Wilder to change his mind. But Weinstein filed no late appeals.

Fitzgerald, formerly of Richmond, was convicted in 1981 of raping and murdering Patricia D. Cubbage, 22, in a Richmond suburb. She was hacked with a machete and knife at least 184 times and had a tick-tack-toe design carved on her body.