Britton's death was the second assassination of a Pensacola abortion provider in under a year and a half; he had replaced David Gunn after the latter's 1993 murder by another anti-abortionist.

Because he had received harassment and death threats, he wore a homemade bulletproof vest, carried a .357 Magnum,[5] and enlisted volunteer bodyguards.

"[4] As Britton arrived at the clinic on July 29, 1994, Hill approached and fired at him with a twelve-gauge shotgun, hitting him in the head and killing him.

The murders resulted in several members of Congress calling for the FBI to infiltrate anti-abortion groups, as it had with the Ku Klux Klan.

In a piece several months earlier in GQ, Tom Junod had profiled a number of parties involved in the murders: not only Britton, but also Hill and the Barretts.