Death Row Killer Gives Final Interview Hours Before His Execution

It's hard to imagine what it'd be like to be on death's door, right up until you're there.

There are plenty of things that'd swim through your mind, but as we say, there's no way of knowing what those thoughts would be, or indeed how you'd react.

Many people on death's row have no choice but to do that, as they fully well know that their time will be up.

Mark Asay, a white supremacist convicted of committing two 'racially motivated' murders, experienced just this. Hours before he was due to be killed for his horrific crimes, he gave one last interview, in which he broke down.

Credit: News4Jax

Today, Asay will become the first white man in Florida to be put to death for killing a black person, the Mirror reports, as authorities will use a a lethal cocktail containing a drug.

He claims that the killings of Robert Booker and Robert McDowell in Jacksonville in 1987, along with his 'white power' and swastika tattoos was something that 'got out of control'.

"Never have been [a white supremacist], I've had African American friends all my life," he claims in his interview. He also says that his racist tattoos came as a result of wanting to 'fit in' when he was imprisoned at the age of 19.

"Well, really, just that I'm sorry and things just got out of control," he said as he sobbed, after the interviewer asked if he had any last thing he wanted to say.

Credit: Florida Department of Corrections

When Asay is put to death the drug etomidate will be used for the first time in this way, with people claiming that the sedative effects are 'unproven' and the manufacturer is reportedly angry that its being used for this purpose.

In 1987, he reportedly shot Booker after he racially abused him. A short time later he agreed to pay mixed-race McDowell for oral sex, but then murdered him when he found out he was a man dressed as a woman.

Booker's older brother Frank still question's his siblings death.

"What was the reason? Was it because of the colour of my brother's skin? That should not have been any reason for him to do that. Not any reason at all," he told the Florida Times-Union.

Asay's older sister Gloria Asay Dean is also hopeful that he'll have his life spared, though after a number of appeals were rejected, it doesn't look likely.

Topics: Death Row, criminal, Murder

Mark McGowan

Mark is a journalist at LADbible, who joined in 2015 after a year as a freelance writer. In the past he blogged for independent football fan channel Redmen TV, after graduating from Staffordshire University with degrees in journalism and English literature. He has worked on campaigns such as UOKM8? and IIOC.