Earlier in the year, Dearman chose to forgo his appeal rights so as to fast-track his execution . "I am guilty," he scribbled in a letter to a judge from April, claiming "it's not fair to the victims or their families to keep prolonging the justice that they so rightly deserve," according to the Mirror US.
"I am willingly giving all that I can possibly give to try and repay a small portion of my debt to society for all the terrible things I've done," declared Dearman in a voice record dispatched to media outlets this week. "From this point forward, I hope that the focus will not be on me, but rather on the healing of all the people that I have hurt."
The victims of the savage attacks on August 20, 2016, at a household near Citronelle, around 33 miles (53km) north of Mobile, were Shannon Melissa Randall, 35; Joseph Adam Turner, 26; Robert Lee Brown, 26; Justin Kaleb Reed, 23; and Chelsea Marie Reed, 22all connected by family ties, reports the Mirror .
One of the victims, Chelsea Reed, who was pregnant with her husband Justin Reed's child, tragically lost her life in the incident. The couple had already chosen the name Aiden Kaleb for their unborn son, as stated in her obituary.
Turner, married to Randall, lived in the same house as the Reeds, while Brown, Randall's brother, was also at the residence on the night of the murders. According to a judge's sentencing order, Joseph Turner, the brother of Dearman's girlfriend, had brought her to the house the day before the killings, seeking shelter from Dearman's violent behavior.
Dearman had visited the house several times that night, asking to see his girlfriend, but was refused permission to stay. Around 3am, he returned to the house, where all the victims were asleep, as detailed in a judge's sentencing order.
Prosecutors disclosed that Dearman used an axe from the garden and a gun found in the house to attack the victims, methodically moving through the property. He then forced his surviving girlfriend to accompany him in a car to Mississippi.
As noted in a judge's 2018 sentencing order, Dearman's father convinced him to turn himself into the authorities. While being taken to jail, Dearman blamed his drug use for the rampage, telling reporters that he was under the influence of methamphetamine when he entered the house, and the "drugs were making me think things that weren't really there happening."
Dearman initially pleaded not guilty but later switched his plea to guilty after parting ways with his legal team.
Given that this was a capital murder case, Alabama law required a jury to examine the evidence and determine if the state had made its case. The jury found Dearman guilty and unanimously recommended a death sentence. Dearman has been on death row since 2018. This is the fifth scheduled execution in Alabama this year.
Two of the state's executions were performed using nitrogen gas. The remaining two were carried out by lethal injection, which continues to be the state's main method of execution.
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