Arthur Lucas
Arthur Lucas, originally from the U.S. state of Georgia, was one of the two last people to be executed in Canada, on 11 December 1962. Lucas had been convicted of the murder of a police informant from Detroit. The murder took place in Toronto.
Lucas, along with fellow prisoner Ronald Turpin, was executed at the Toronto Jail by hanging, the only form of civilian capital punishment ever used in post-Confederation Canada, although the military employed execution by firing squad. In 1976, capital punishment for murder was removed from Canada's Criminal Code, but could still be used under the National Defence Act until 1998. When both men were informed that they would likely be the last people ever to hang in Canada, Lucas said, "Some consolation."
Chaplain Cyrill Everitt attended the double hanging and in 1986, shortly before his death, he revealed that Lucas's head was "nearly torn right off" because the hangman had miscalculated the man's weight.
