TEXAS, United States: Texas on Wednesday carried out the first execution in the United States this year, putting to death a man convicted of killing his ex-girlfriend and her new partner in a 1998 shooting that left a family devastated for decades.
Charles Victor Thompson, 55, was pronounced dead at 6:50 p.m. Central Time at the Huntsville Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice following a lethal injection, prison officials said.
Thompson was sentenced to death for the murders of Dennise Hayslip, 39, and her boyfriend, Darren Cain, 30, who were shot at Hayslip’s apartment in a Houston-area suburb. Cain died at the scene, while Hayslip succumbed to her injuries several days later in a hospital, according to USA Today.
According to court records, Thompson went to Hayslip’s apartment in the early hours of April 30, 1998, after she told him she wanted to continue her relationship with Cain.
Police were initially called after a confrontation between the two men but allowed Thompson to leave. He returned several hours later armed with a gun, broke down the apartment door, and opened fire.
Cain was shot multiple times and killed instantly. Hayslip was shot as she tried to flee and later identified Thompson as the attacker before dying from her wounds.
Among the witnesses to the execution was Wade Hayslip, Dennise Hayslip’s son, who was 13 years old at the time of the murders. Now 41, Hayslip said Thompson’s execution marked a turning point rather than closure. “It’s the end of a chapter and the beginning of a new one,” he told USA Today. “I’m looking forward to the new one.”
In his final statement, Thompson expressed remorse and acknowledged the lasting harm caused by his actions. “There are no winners in this situation,” he said, according to prison officials. “It creates more victims and traumatizes more people decades later. I’m sorry for what I did.”
Thompson gained national attention in 2005 after a brazen escape from a Harris County jail during a resentencing hearing. Disguised as an investigator using smuggled clothing and a doctored prison ID, he walked out of the facility before being recaptured days later in Louisiana.
Despite the notoriety, Thompson spent more than two decades on death row, during which he attracted supporters and maintained an online presence that periodically drew criticism from the victims’ families.
His execution follows a particularly active year for capital punishment in the United States. Authorities carried out 47 executions in 2025 — the highest number since 2009. Florida led the nation with 19 executions, followed by Alabama, South Carolina, and Texas with five each.
Most executions last year were conducted by lethal injection, though some states also used firing squads and nitrogen hypoxia, a method condemned by United Nations experts as inhumane.
The death penalty remains legal in 27 U.S. states, though 23 have abolished it and three others — California, Orego,n and Pennsylvania — currently have moratoriums in place.
President Donald Trump has repeatedly voiced support for capital punishment, calling for its expanded use in what he describes as the “vilest crimes.”
For Wade Hayslip, the focus now is on remembering his mother — a hardworking business owner who prioritized her son’s education and instilled in him compassion for others — rather than the man who killed her.
“For so long, the attention was on him,” Hayslip said. “That overshadowed who she was and what she represented.”
