Billy Ray Irick execution: Anti-death penalty vigils held across Tennessee

Anti-death penalty advocates gathered across the state in churches and outside a Nashville prison for vigils ahead of Tennessee's first planned execution in nearly a decade.

Billy Ray Irick was executed Thursday by lethal injection for the 1985 rape and murder of 7-year-old Paula Dyer. He was pronounced dead at 7:48 p.m.

In the moments leading up to the execution, the mood was somber among a subdued crowd of about 50 anti-death penalty protesters gathered on a grassy area outside Riverbend Maximum Security Institution under gray skies.

Witnesses describe execution of Billy Ray Irick Seven members of the media witnessed the execution of Billy Ray Irick.

As the group formed a circle at 7 p.m. and lit candles, they said the Prayer of St. Francis while just a few yards away — separated by a chain link fence — a small group of death penalty supporters had gathered. Among them was Rick Laude of Nashville, who carried a portable speaker. He began playing the song "Hells Bells" by the rock group AC/DC.

Laude said he tries to show up at the executions of inmates whose victims are children. He said he was there for Dyer.

“To the Billy Ray Irick family, I hope they claim his body and cremate his remains and throw his remains in a landfill,” Laude said.

“To Paula Dyer and her friends and family, I am so sorry that they have gone through this. I could not even imagine what they are going through.” he said.

The Rev. John Boylan, a Franciscan priest with the Ecumenical Catholic Church who is opposed to the death penalty, said he came to the prison “in witness. To say ‘no, not in my name.'"

Boylan said he wants the death penalty abolished, calling it "a form of state-sponsored murder."

“To me, it makes a mockery of the gospel," said Boylan, who leads a new church in Spring Hill called Christ the Prophet. It meets in a home and has about a dozen members.

Agents and officers with the Tennessee Department of Corrections divided the field outside the prison into sections, separating those who are in favor of and those who are against the death penalty.

One pro-death penalty advocate screamed across the fence, "All you care about is a monster." He asked the group if it was praying for Dyer. It provoked little reaction from the anti-death penalty crowd.

Hank Mills was among those who opposed the death penalty. Mills said he started visiting inmate Jessie Dotson about a year ago. He became involved in being a death row visitor through his church, St. Paul’s Episcopal Church in Murfreesboro.

Visiting death row and Dotson changed Mills’ perspective on the death penalty, he said. While Mills said he is still grappling with some of the nuances of it, he is more firmly in the anti-death penalty camp now because of his personal experience.

He showed up Thursday night outside the prison to stand in solidarity with the other visitors to death row, he said.

“We’re taking this very personally. I know there’s nothing that we can do at this point except pray and support each other and go back and continue visiting and hoping that perhaps at some point Tennessee will decide that this is not the thing to do,” Mills said.

In Nashville, more than 60 protesters gathered at Fisk Memorial Chapel.

The vigils were organized by Tennesseans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty, or TADP.

Stacy Rector, TADP's director, called the death penalty a "failing" policy.

"This policy isn't working," she said, citing its costs and death row prisoners who have exonerated by new evidence. "It's not making us safer."

"Our hearts go out to Paula Dyer's family," she said. "This has been going on for them for more than 30 years."

The first to arrive at Fisk was Joyce Perkins, 75, who has protested the death penalty since her early teens.

“We have our voice, we have to speak out,” she said. “I may be standing here for a few people tonight."

Thursday was not the first vigil Perkins has attended. She is a mental health therapist who works in private practice, and said she works with a “tough” population dealing with addictions and mental health issues.

She has been at gatherings outside other prisons during three executions.

“This isn’t an issue where you can go back and forth, you can’t go case by case,” she said. “You have to be either for or against it.”

In Knoxville, a small group of people gathered inside the Shalom House at Church of the Savior to pray, sing, read Bible verses and reflect in silence on what was about to happen.

"It's a weighty matter for the state to put someone to death," said Justin Phillips, also a member of TADP. "We should treat it with the seriousness it deserves."

Attendees paused to remember everyone involved, from Irick and his family; to the family of Paula Dyer; to the corrections officers involved in the process of executing Irick; to the members of the media who witnessed him take his last breaths.

"Let's not let this moment of tragedy pass without some real hard reflection about what's going to happen in our state tonight," Phillips said.

Protesters gather in Memphis over the execution of Billy Ray Irick Protesters sing to protest the execution of Billy Ray Irick

In Memphis, about 30 people gathered on the steps of First Congregational Church.

At one point they sat in silence, then Lisa Canonspoke. She said Tennessee’s execution system is broken, that the death penalty process traumatizes state prison workers who participate in it, and that the drawn-out appeals process leaves victims’ families in limbo.

She took a seat on the steps and the group began singing a song with the chorus “Give Peace to Every Heart.”

Shortly before the 7 p.m. execution time, members of the group began distributing and lighting candles.

Canon addressed the group again, and quoted Samuel Rayan, a Catholic theologian from India: "'A candlelight is a protest at midnight. It is a non-conformist. It says to the darkness, I beg to differ.'"

Reporter Anita Wadhwani contributed.