True Crime On This Day April 22nd

April 22nd

On April 22nd in true crime, murder in Virginia, Israel attack, mass executions, murder at Cocoa Beach, and Carlos the Jackal.

1978

In Newport, Virginia, former police officer Frank James Coppola murdered flower delivery woman Muriel Hatchell by repeatedly slamming her head into the floor.

The murder had come during a robbery at Hatchell’s home when Coppola and accomplices pretended to be flower delivery people in order to gain access to the property.

Coppola was arrested shortly after and sentenced to death. He was executed by electrocution in Virginia on August 8^th 1982.

1979

In Nahariya, Israel, the Nahariya Attack took place. It was a raid carried out by four Palestine Liberation Front (PLF) attackers who codenamed the attack; The Nasser Operation.

The perpetrators were Abdel Majeed Asslan, Mhanna Salim al-Muayed, Ahmed al-Abras and Samir Kuntar. During the attack they killed four Israelis including two young children.

Kuntar and al-Abras were later captured and sentenced to life in prison but were later set free in prisoner swap deals.

1980

In Liberia, ten days after the coup d’etat, 13 government officials were executed by firing squad at a beach near Monrovia. Following a farcical public trial, four former senior government officials, including President Frank E. Tolbert, were sentenced to death.

Another nine were sentenced to life in prison. Yet, all 13 officials were led to the beach and shot dead before being placed in a mass grave.

In the years that followed, Tolbert became a national hero in what was perceived as an illegal coup. Over 40 years later, there were calls for a national holiday for Tolbert and the others killed in the coup.

1982

In Paris, France, during the morning rush hour, a large car bomb exploded on Rue Marbeuf in the 8th arrondissement of the city. It killed one person and wounded another 60.

The target was said to have been the offices of the Lebanese newspaper Al-Watan al-Arabi. Despite numerous suspects, it wasn’t until 2011 when Carlos the Jackal was convicted of his involvement in the attack.

Carlos, whose real name is Ilich Ramírez Sánchez, was a Venezuelan terrorist responsible for at least 16 murders.

1983

In Alabama, convicted murderer John Louis Evans was the first convict to be executed in the State, after the United States reinstated the death penalty in 1976.

Evans and a fellow convict had been paroled from a prison in Indiana in 1976 and went on a crime spree that involved over 30 armed robberies, nine kidnappings, and the murder of pawn shop owner Edward Nassar in 1977.

Evans was executed in the electric chair three times over a 24-minute period as doctors found a heartbeat after the first two surges of electricity passed through his body. His execution is often cited by opponents of the death penalty.

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