The Nation - News from July 31, 1987

A mentally retarded man who raped and murdered an 11-year-old girl was put to death in Louisiana’s electric chair despite a lawyer’s pleas that he be spared because of his impairment. John Brogdon, 25, was the seventh person in two months to be executed in Louisiana and the 86th nationwide in the last decade. His defense attorney and the prosecuting attorney watched from opposite ends of the witness room as Brogdon was executed for raping Barbara Jo Brown in 1981, then stabbing her with broken bottles and beating her on the head with a brick. “God bless, ya’ll,” Brogdon said, almost as an afterthought, on his way into the death chamber.