Billy Ray Hamilton
Billy Ray Hamilton died on October 22, 2007, while held on California's death row, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation, which said he died of natural causes. He was 57 and died at an outside hospital in the San Joaquin Valley, decades after his case began and before the state could carry out a death sentence imposed in 1982. A former public defender, Gerald Kahl, described him as "a nice guy" who did not try to overwhelm him or tell him how to handle the case. The families of the people killed in 1980 said they were bewildered by the long wait and glad he was dead.
Cause of death, as reported: Died of illness. The California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation said he died of natural causes at an outside hospital while on death row.
Reported by: California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (the agency that held him). The only account of how this person died comes from the agency that held him.