Thread 17918005

Stephen Michael West was the eleventh person executed by Tennessee since 1976, for the brutal double murder of a Union County woman and her daughter in 1986. Not much is known about West's early life aside from his birth date on September 16, 1962 and the fact that he had enlisted in the Army after high school, served three years, and was a physically powerful individual, standing 6'1" and weighing 170 pounds. At the time of the murder, he was married and his wife was pregnant with their first child. In March 1986, West and 17 year old Ronnie Martin, were co-workers at a Lake City McDonald's and had only met two weeks prior to the murders when they took Martin's mother's car for a joyride in the countryside. Martin claimed he knew a girl who was sexually available. West had never met Wanda Romines, 51, or her 15 year old daughter Sheila, but Martin was an acquaintance of them.

In the early morning hours of March 17, their husband and father Jack Romines left for work while the boys waited in the bushes nearby. As soon as he was gone, they knocked on the door, Wanda answered and invited them in, and Martin introduced West to her and Sheila and said he wanted to borrow money.

That afternoon, Jack Romines came home to find a horrific sight. His wife and daughter lay in the master bedroom dead and gruesomely mutilated. He called police in a panic. Autopsy of the two females found extensive mutilating knife injuries which forensic pathologist Dr. Cleland Blake described as "torture type cuts." Sheila was raped and then stabbed in the abdomen 17 times including three cuts to the heart. The abdominal wounds were probably inflicted before the fatal heart ones; some of them penetrated the liver and mesentery; the abdominal cavity had a good deal of blood in it, so clearly they were administered prior to the cessation of circulation. The 15 year old had other injuries to the left forearm and thumb. Dr. Blake believed the wounds, especially the ones to the liver, would have been "incredibly painful."

Wanda was also stabbed numerous times, one knife thrust collapsed her right lung and there were other wounds to the colon, gall bladder, and liver, the fatal blow being a thrust that severed the right common iliac artery, causing massive bleeding into the abdominal cavity. The evidence seemed to suggest two persons had done all this, not merely one.

The phone cable to the house had also been cut, Jack Romines's .38 pistol was missing, and $200 in cash. The gun was found in a storm drain in Norris, about 15 miles away. A friend of Martin's testified that Martin had visited his house and borrowed a butcher knife from him.

West and Martin were identified not long afterwards as their blue '82 Malibu was seen parked in the vicinity of the Romines's house on March 17. A neighbor reported seeing a car stuck at the end of his driveway. He went outside and noticed one of his fence posts was taken down to help extricate the vehicle from the ditch. They got it out and drove off, and the man recognized West and Martin. The two were quickly apprehended. West denied being a willing participant in the butchery of the two women and claimed Martin did the whole thing and threatened to attack and rape his own mother and sister if he tried to stop him and that he had a gun and two knives with him. His version of events seemed unbelievable; why would a six foot tall ex-Army serviceman have anything to fear from a teenager who was a good 30 pounds lighter and a few inches shorter? Even if West was unwilling to physically intervene to save the two victims, couldn't he have at least fled the house?

West made five different statements about what happened in the Romines' house. Initially he said they had consensual sex with Sheila and left, then they came back and Martin decided to borrow money from them, that Martin was gone about 30 minutes, and when Martin came back to the car they drove off. It was in a later statement that West tried to pin the entire crime on his companion. He claimed Martin demanded that Sheila perform oral sex on him after which he anally sodomized her, and that Martin pointed the gun at his forehead and joked about shooting him. "I saw a man outside the house and I wanted to go out there and tell him what happened, but I kept seeing [my wife] like Sheila there." West went back to his McDonald's shift later that day and did not tell anyone about the murders.

The two defendants were tried separately. West's trial began March 16, 1987, almost exactly a year since the murders, and despite his protestations of innocence, he failed to convince a jury that he was a hapless witness to a double murder and that he'd been unable to stop Martin from killing the two females, and he was found guilty and sentenced to death. Martin was tried and also found guilty, but as he was 17 when the murders took place was ineligible for the death penalty. He received 40 to life.

Stephen West, after last ditch appeals failed, was executed in the electric chair at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution on August 15, 2019. Ronnie Martin continues to serve his sentence; he will be eligible for parole in 2027.

>>17918023
ha ha he looks 13. you're asking me to believe West wasn't a willing participant? come on, man.

I hate the South and everything in it.

>>17918023
>Ronnie Martin continues to serve his sentence; he will be eligible for parole in 2027

>>17918023
looks like a FAS victim. i mean it is Tennessee.

>>17918023
>>17918005 (OP)
They're white, we don't care. Post a thread where the perp is black and we'll have something to discuss.

>>17918009
that's fucking nasty