Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Tina Curl was so eager to see her 9-year-old daughter's killer executed that she couldn't even take her seat in the witness room.

Donald Moeller received a lethal injection at the South Dakota State Penitentiary in Sioux Falls late Tuesday night as punishment for the 1990 kidnap, rape and killing of young Becky O'Connell.

Curl made the 1,400-mile trip from her home in New York state to Sioux Falls to witness the execution. She says she was right up to the glass because she wanted to see it up close.

Moeller kidnapped Becky from a Sioux Falls convenience store where she'd gone to buy sugar to make lemonade at home. He drove her to a secluded area near the Big Sioux River, then raped and stabbed her.