The South Carolina double murderer executed by firing squad was in “great spirits and ready to go join the Lord” as he faced his demise, his brother told The Post.
Brad Sigmon, who became the first American death row inmate to die by firing squad in 15 years, was dignified in the face of death, according to sibling Mike.
“He had a proud face when he sat down to be shot. I’m never going to feel relieved about it but he said what he wanted to say and he died the way he wanted to die,” Mike Sigmon, 66, said.
Brad Sigmon, 67, was sentenced to death in July 2002 after he was convicted of kidnapping his girlfriend of three years, Rebecca Barbare, and brutally killing her parents David and Gladys Larke in their Greenville county home.
Brad’s three brothers and two sisters made one last visit to prison to see him a week ago, Mike said, and they all hugged him one last time. One of Brad’s sons, Robbie, had a private visit with his father on Wednesday.
Sigmon’s 85-year-old mother has Alzheimer’s and is in a nursing home. Her children have not told her of Brad’s execution nor do they plan to, Mike told The Post.
Mike Sigmon said his brother, who was captured in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, 11 days after the murders, wanted to die back in 2001 when he committed the murders.
“He’s been apologetic since the day he was captured,” he said. “He wanted death by cop. He called my mom and she said you know my phone is tapped. He knew. He wanted to pretend he had a gun behind his back so the cops would shoot him but they tackled him so fast he had no time to react.”
Brad was high on crack cocaine and drunk when he told a friend he would “get Becky for leaving him the way she did,” and “tie her parents up,” according to court documents.
Sigmon then broke into the Larke home in Greenville County and beat the Larkes to death with a baseball bat on April 27, 2001. He then kidnapped Barbare who managed to later escape even though he shot her while she fled.
In a confession, Sigmon said, “I couldn’t have her, I wasn’t going to let anybody else have her.”
Sigmon was pronounced dead at 6:08 p.m. after three state corrections department volunteers armed with rifles lined up behind a wall about 15 feet away and fired off shots at a target on the hooded killer’s heart at 6:05 p.m.
He chose death by firing squad because he was worried that execution via electric chair or lethal injection could be drawn-out and painful, according to his attorneys.
Mike Sigmon said Saturday that the media had blown many things out of proportion in the case – and claimed the baseball bat used in the murders was “just a little souvenir type bat,” Mike Sigmon said Saturday, calling his brother a “good man” who “cared about everyone.”
“There were a lot of people who called me all last night saying we’re sorry about your brother,” he said. “Brad actually tried to get three buckets of chicken for his last meal to share with cellmates. He was always trying to help other people get a decent meal. We’d give him money and he’d use it to get some other guy a decent dinner.”
“But everyone thinks he was this evil person a monster. Everyone wants to keep blowing it up. There’s videos all over Youtube by people who don’t know jacksh-t about Brad.”
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