Until He Is Dead James Thomas Rusher

978-1887905-73-2 1-887905-73-1 $29.95 hardcover 246 pages b&w photos, index Parkway Publishers

Until He is Dead is a fascinating account of the administration of death penalty during 1900s in the western North Carolina mountain counties. Rusher presents the evolution of the application of death penalty from hangings to electrocution to the injection of lethal gas. Rusher chronicles rape cases in Mitchell and Madison counties and murder cases in Avery and Watauga counties. While two of these condemned men were hanged, the other two successfully fought off the death penalty. about the author James Thomas Rusher is a native of Salisbury, North Carolina and was elected District Attorney in the 24th Prosecutorial District of North Carolina in 1982, and was re-elected four times. Rusher retired from public office at the end of 2002.