Texas prison serves its final "last meal"

By: Angela Wendler

A Texas prison has served their final "last meal" to inmates awaiting execution on death row.

Lawrence Russell Brewer, one of the men convicted in 1998 of the racially motivated killing of James Byrd Jr. in Jasper, was the final recipient of a "last meal" per his request.

State prison officials decided Thursday that the "last meal" tradition would end after honoring Brewer's elaborate meal request.

Brewer ordered two chicken fried steaks, a triple-meat bacon cheeseburger, fried okra, a pound of barbecue, three fajitas, a meat lover's pizza, a pint of ice cream and a slab of peanut butter fudge with crushed peanuts. Brewer did not eat any of it, reported USA Today.

The New York Times reported that State Senator John Whitmire, chairman of the Senate of Criminal Justice and Houston Democrat, was furious about the practice of serving "last meals." The victims of the inmates on death row never had the opportunity to choose their last meal, and therefore, neither should the inmates, he said.

Inmates on death row will now eat what the kitchen is serving on the day of their execution.