Frederick Charles Wood

Frederick Charles Wood was born in 1911, into a middle-class working family from Elmira, New York. While not much is known about his early childhood, Wood began engaging in petty crimes as he entered adolescence, but avoided repercussions for most of it. Later on in life, Wood claimed that he committed his first murder in 1926, aged 14, by poisoning his 20-year-old girlfriend Cynthia Mary Longo in Hornell. Suspecting that she was dating another boy, he bought three cream puffs and laced them with arsenic, which he gave to Longo and two other friends. While the other two survived, she did not. The coroner erroneously diagnosed her cause of death as "dilation of the heart caused by excessive vomiting", listing her as 22 years old. After completing his first year of high school, Wood quit his studies, causing conflict with his father, who sent him away to be examined at the Binghamton State Hospital. During the two months he spent there, psychiatrists deduced that the teenager had an "about average" IQ of 99. After his discharge, Wood was convicted of grand larceny and given a 10-year suspended sentence for automobile theft. In an effort to straighten him out, his father then sent him to a private school in Dobbs Ferry, where Frederick remained for a year and a half. He was released after becoming of age. That same year, he broke the conditions of his sentence after holding up a man for 25 cents and was sent to the Elmira Reformatory, now Elmira Correctional Facility, where he remained until he was paroled in April 1931. Wood was returned there the following year for public intoxication and harassing women. In 1932, he was temporarily transferred to the Dannemora State Hospital for the Criminally Insane, but sent back to Elmira just a few months later. In November 1932, he was paroled. ==Murder of Pearl Robinson==

At some point in 1933, Wood, who frequently used the services of prostitutes, contracted a venereal disease, causing him to develop a seething hatred towards women. At the time, the police's leading theory was that Robinson knew her killer, prompting them to largely ignore Wood as a potential suspect. ==Lowman murder==

In February 1940, Wood was discharged and returned home to Elmira. In 1942, after perceiving that 42-year-old local carpenter and World War II veteran John E. Lowman had been pestering his girlfriend, Wood invited him to a rooming house in the city. After Lowman allegedly insulted his girlfriend, Wood, in a drunken rage, hit him on the head with a beer bottle. When Lowman fell, Wood stomped on his head and slashed him with his knife. Intent on dismembering the body and disposing of the remains in trash bags, Wood stuffed the body under a couch to keep it hidden. The next day, he told his girlfriend about the murder, but did not show her the body. The day after that, Wood and his girlfriend told his father about the murder. This resulted in an argument between Wood and his father, which led to his mother calling the police and his arrest on a disorderly conduct charge. Wood pleaded guilty to the charge the following day and was sentenced to five days in the county jail. Just minutes after he was sentenced on the disorderly conduct charge, Wood's girlfriend discovered Lowman's body. Wood was charged with murder. He was quickly convicted and sentenced to 20 years to life. The day before his sentencing, Wood unsuccessfully tried to commit suicide by slashing his wrists. At the end of his trial in March 1943, Justice Bertram L. Newman was quoted as saying that "For the protection of society, [Wood] should never be released from prison." Wood was sent off to Attica State Prison. A few months later, he was transferred to Dannemora State Hospital for the Criminally Insane. In December 1950, he was transferred to Clinton State Prison. ==Double murder and arrest==

On June 2, 1960, despite the protests of the judges, prosecutors and residents of Elmira, the Parole Board approved Wood's parole request, on the condition that he move to Albany. The confession caused great outrage among the New York public and embarrassed the Parole Board, whose chairman, Russell G. Oswald, had to issue a statement declaring the decision to parole Wood "a mistake." ==Trial, imprisonment and execution==

A few months after his arrest, Wood was brought to trial for the murders of Rescigno and Sess. Against the advice of his lawyers, Wood took the stand at his trial, readily declaring that he was sane when he committed his murders and he had loved killing. For the rest of the proceedings, he constantly cracked jokes and acted jovially, and when asked about his job status, he jokingly declared that he was a "wine sampler". In the following years, Wood's execution was stayed on three occasions, as attorneys and civil liberties unions attempted to have his sentence commuted to life imprisonment on the grounds of insanity. In spite of their attempts, Wood dismissed them all, saying that he welcomed death and pleaded for an opportunity to "ride the lightning". On March 21, 1963, he was brought to the execution chamber at Sing Sing, where he joked to the witnesses present, stating that "[he] has a speech to make an educational project. You will see the effect of electricity on Wood. Enjoy yourself." Wood, still laughing, then sat down in the chair, brushing it off with his hand, smoking a cigarette and waiting patiently until they had finished the preparational procedure. As the hood was placed over his face, he was still smiling. Minutes later, he was electrocuted. Wood was the penultimate prisoner executed in the state before the death penalty was abolished altogether. ==See also==