Who Was Michael Samra? Alabama Executes Man For 1997 Quadruple Murder

Alabama executed a man who was condemned for his role in a quadruple killing in 1997 that followed a dispute over the use of a pickup truck. Michael Brandon Samra, 41, was given a three-drug lethal injection Thursday at the state prison in Atmore, making it the second execution in the state so far this year.

Samra, along with a friend, Mark Duke, was convicted of capital murder in the deaths of Duke’s father, the father’s girlfriend and the woman’s two elementary-age daughters in 1997. The two adults were shot and the children had their throats slit. Investigators found that Duke, who was 16 at the time of the crime, planned the killings because he was angry with his father. He involved Samra, who was 19 at the time, in his plotting.

Duke killed his father with a gunshot to the face and Samra shot the man's girlfriend, Dedra Mims Hunt, who survived and fled to another part of the house. Duke found the woman in a bathroom and shot her, court documents show. He then used a knife to slit the throat of the woman's 6-year-old daughter, Chelisa Hunt. Samra cut the throat of the woman's 7-year-old daughter, Chelsea Hunt.

The teenagers, Duke and Samra, were handed the death penalty after their trials. The Alabama Court of Criminal Appeals, in 2005, however, overturned Duke's death penalty because of his age at the time he committed the crime. He is currently serving a life sentence without parole.

In a last statement, Samra made a profession of Christian faith, the Associated Press reported.

The families of the victims released a statement following Samra's execution, thanking the community for supporting them and said: "Today justice was carried out."

Gov. Kay Ivey, who rejected Samra's clemency petition, released a statement following the execution.

"For more than 20 years, the loved ones of Randy, Dedra and the two young daughters Chelisa and Chelsea have mourned an unbearable and unimaginable loss. Four lives were brutally taken far too soon because of the malicious, intentional and planned-out murders by Michael Brandon Samra.

"Alabama will not stand for the loss of life in our state, and with this heinous crime, we must respond with punishment. These four victims deserved a future, and Mr. Samra took that opportunity away from them and did so with no sense of remorse. This evening justice has been delivered to the loved ones of these victims, and it signals that Alabama does not tolerate murderous acts of any nature.

"After careful consideration of the horrendous nature of the crime, the jury’s decision and all factors surrounding the case, the state of Alabama carried out Mr. Samra’s sentence this evening. Although this can never recover the lives lost, I pray that their loved ones can finally find a sense of peace.”

Another execution was carried out Thursday, in Tennessee, of 68-year-old Don Johnson, who was sentenced to death for the 1984 suffocation of his wife in Memphis. Johnson became the fourth person executed in Tennessee since August.