Heading: (Execution)
Author:
Title: Photograph of Arthur Gooch, about to be hung for his part in kidnapping two police officers
Place Published: No place
Publisher:
Date Published: 1936
Description: Gelatin silver photograph. Typed description affixed to verso along with a few rubberstamps & other markings. 20.7x16 cm (8¼x6¼").Photograph of the notorious if short-lived American criminal Arthur Gooch, notable for being the only person executed under the Federal Kidnapping Act (i.e. Lindbergh Law) who did not kill the victim.Gooch and Ambrose Nix kidnapped police officers R.N. Baker and H.R. Marks in Texas on November 26, 1934, and released them in Oklahoma. Baker was badly injured after being shoved into a glass case, which then broke during the kidnapping. This made the crime a capital offense since the victims had not been released unharmed. Nix was killed while resisting arrest on December 23, 1934.

Although the electric chair was the only lawful method of execution in Oklahoma at this time, Gooch was executed by hanging. The sentence was carried out by Oklahoma's state executioner, Rich Owens on June, 19. 1936. According to the witnesses Gooch's hanging was botched and his death lasted 15 minutes. Many blamed Owens for this failure, as this was the only hanging he ever performed and the first hanging in Oklahoma since 1911.

Light creasing and wear, very good.