Execution Report: Michael Hall

Michael Wayne Hall, 31, was executed by lethal injection on 15 February 2011 in Huntsville, Texas for the abduction and murder of a 19-year-old woman.

On 15 February 1998, Hall, then 18, and Robert Neville, 23, went to the Kroger grocery store in Arlington where their friend and former co-worker, Amy Robinson, worked as a checker. They checked her schedule to see what time she would be arriving for work, then they picked a spot and waited in their car for her to ride by on her bicycle. They had a rifle, a pellet gun, ammunition, and a crossbow with them. When Robinson rode by, Hall and Neville stopped her and offered her a ride. They coaxed her into their car, promising that they would drop her off at work after taking a short drive in the country. As Neville drove, Robinson complained that she did not want to be late for work.

After driving about twelve miles from the store, Neville pretended to have a flat tire and pulled the car over on a dirt road by a field in east Fort Worth. Hall grabbed a pellet gun, Neville took the crossbow, then they both got out of the car and walked into the field while Robinson stayed in the car and listened to the radio. At some point, Hall persuaded Robinson to exit the car, telling her she needed to go talk to Neville.

As Robinson walked toward Neville, he fired a crossbow at her several times. All of his shots missed, but the last arrow grazed her hair, making her angry. As she started walking back to the car, Hall shot her in the back of the leg with his pellet gun. He and Neville laughed at Robinson when she cried in pain. Neville then obtained a .22-caliber rifle from the car and shot her in the chest. Hall then shot her in the chest "three or four or six times" with the pellet gun. Robinson fell to the ground, making loud noises and shaking. Hall stood over her for five to ten minutes, watching. Neville then became concerned that someone would hear the loud noises Robinson was making, so he killed her with a shot to the head. They left the victim and her bicycle where they would not be easily discovered, then left.

That day, a store employee called Robinson's family to notify them that she had not shown up for work. The family then called the police, who questioned Hall and Neville. Neville told the police that he used to work with Robinson and knew her socially, but had not seen her in a couple of months.

A few days later, Hall and Neville returned to the scene of the killing. Neville fired shots into Robinson's body. Hall took keys and money from her pocket.

Two weeks later, Hall's mother reported to the police that he had been missing for several days. Hall's stepbrother told the police that Hall told him he and Neville abducted and killed Amy Robinson. Hall and Neville were arrested in Eagle Pass on 3 March while trying to cross the border into Mexico. Robinson's body was discovered the same day.

Hall told authorities that he decided to kill someone because he was angry that the had a "sucky-ass" life. He and Neville began obtaining weapons and decided upon a victim. They initially wanted to kill a black person, but they chose Robinson because she trusted them and they "didn't have to put bruises on her to get her in the car." Robinson, who was part Native American, also suffered from Turner's syndrome, a genetic disorder that made her physically small and slow and mentally retarded. She stood four feet five inches tall and had the mental capacity of a third or fourth grader.

In television interviews after their arrests, the two men bragged about the killing. Hall boasted that he was the one who persuaded the victim to trust them, and that she would have escaped had Neville tried to kill her by himself. When asked how he felt about the way Robinson died, he expressed no remorse, but said, "Well, I wouldn't want to be in her place. She had to take a lot of pain." Hall also told the media that he and Neville wanted to become serial killers and kill one to five people per week. They also wanted to become white supremacists and kill minorities. "We had a bet going to see who could shoot and kill the most people between the two of us," Hall said. "No matter if it was blacks or Mexicans - anybody as long as they weren't our color."

Hall had no prior criminal history. At his trial, there was some discussion of his mental capacity. Several defense witnesses testified that Hall had difficulty in school and in performing simple daily tasks, such as counting change or cutting meat with a knife. Tamara Campbell, Hall's former supervisor at Kroger, testified for the state that Hall was "lazy", but not mentally challenged. Witnesses from both sides agreed that Hall's writing and math skills were on an elementary school level, but that he could read well enough to pass his driver's license test, and he had no difficulty communicating verbally. Cheryl Conner, one of Hall's teachers in high school, testified that he was inattentive in class, and would sometimes drool, fall asleep, or simply sit and stare. On the other hand, Conner and other witnesses testified that he was good at tasks he was motivated in, such as playing video games.

A tape of Hall's interview with Fox 4 News was played to the jury.

Continued on Page 2