16 March 2006 :

Tommie Hughes was put to death by lethal injection for the 1997 robbery and murder of a Dallas woman in a movie theater parking lot. Hughes, 32, was condemned for killing Foulke Erinkitola, 25, after he and a cousin robbed Erinkitola and her friend, Roxanne Mendoza, 29.
Hughes waved an automatic pistol at the women during the robbery and shot them each in the head while his cousin was walking to a car where Hughes' girlfriend waited, witnesses testified at his 1998 trial for Erinkitola's murder.
Hughes maintained his innocence and claimed his girlfriend shot the two women in a jealous rage while he and his cousin were talking to them.
In a final statement while strapped to a gurney in the death chamber, Hughes spoke to
his family.
"I love my family," he said. "You all stay strong. Watch over each other. Stay strong. I love you. I love you. It's my hour. It's my hour. I love you. Stay strong."
Hughes was the fifth person executed in Texas this year and the 360th since the state
resumed capital punishment in 1982, six years after the US Supreme Court lifted a national death penalty ban. Both totals lead the nation.
An additional 15 executions are scheduled in Texas through August.