Danny Joe Bradley executed.

Danny Joe Bradley was on death row in Alabama for more than 26 years.

February 12, 2009






Bradley was convicted of murdering his 12 year old stepdaughter, Rhonda Hardin who was sexually assaulted and strangled in Piedmont on the night of January 24, 1983.

Bradley, 49, was pronounced dead at 6:15 pm As he was strapped to the gurney in the execution chamber, he offered no last words.

Some of his family was in attendance.

At the time of his stepdaughter's murder, Bradley was caring for the 12-year-old girl and her younger brother, Gary Hardin Jr., while their mother was in the hospital.

Gary Hardin Jr. and his wife Jennie were on hand for the execution, but did not witness it.

The U.S. Supreme Court denied a stay of execution clearing the way for him to be put to death for the rape and strangulation of his 12-year-old stepdaughter.

Bradley's attorney had sought a Supreme Court stay of execution to allow more court review of Bradley's civil rights lawsuit on a DNA-related issue from his trial in Calhoun County, but lower courts had already denied that request.

Bradley's attorneys had asked the Supreme Court to put his execution on hold until it decided if an Alaska inmate could have DNA testing done on some of the evidence collected against him in a 1993 rape and kidnapping case.

Bradley wanted to DNA-test some of the evidence -- now missing -- from his case, but the state had argued that he had access to other evidence and that DNA testing of some of those items had proved his guilt.

The attorneys were hard at work and tried to obtain a stay of execution for Bradley. However the courts denied the defenses request for a stay. The defense claimed they needed more time to perform DNA testing, again, I must ask how much time is required to test DNA.

Bradley was on death row for more than 26 years, surely they had all the time they needed for DNA testing.

Bradley was the second Alabama Death Row inmate to be executed in a month.

Bradley became the 193rd inmate to be put to death by the state since 1927, the 40th since executions resumed in the state in 1983 after an 18-year pause, and the 16th to die by lethal injection.

Alabama now has 205 Death Row inmates, all but four of them male.