John William Byrd Jr. (December 18, 1963 – February 19, 2002) was an American murderer who was executed by lethal injection for killing convenience store clerk Monte Tewksbury.

Byrd, who protested his innocence until his execution, spent 18 years and 6 months on Ohio's death row.

On the evening of April 17, 1983, Monte Tewksbury, 40, was working alone as the night clerk at a convenience store in Hamilton County, Ohio.

Tewksbury, who was married and a father of three children, worked full-time for Procter & Gamble, and moonlighted at the store as a second job to help provide for his family.

A resident of a nearby apartment, disturbed by a loud engine, looked outside and saw Byrd and Brewer get into a large red van with a broken tail light parked in the lot.

At the same time, a customer arrived at the store and found Tewksbury standing outside the building and leaning against the wall next to the telephone, bleeding from his side.

Sharon quickly arrived at the scene and held her dying husband in her arms as he repeated his statements.

Tewksbury was transported to a hospital, and while en route, made statements to the effect that he did not understand why he had been stabbed, because he had been cooperative and had complied with the robbers' requests.

One of the passengers, later identified as John Eastle Brewer, exited the van and approached the police car.

The van's driver, William Danny Woodall, and Byrd provided the officer with identification, which was called in to the dispatcher.

On direct examination, Brewer denied ever participating in the killing or injury of anyone, and he testified that the statement he gave to detectives was true to the best of his recollection.

Brewer denied ever committing any crime of violence, and testified that he knew nothing about either of the robberies, and by extension, Tewksbury's murder.

The state public defender advised the parole board that Armstead should be released because of his cooperation and because he was in danger in prison.

Byrd's appeals were based heavily on statements made by Brewer after he was convicted and sentenced to at least 41 years in prison.

The affidavits from Brewer clearly place Byrd at the scene of the crime, a difficult fact to overcome in trial.

The Public Defender introduced the first two, prompting the federal appellate court to stay Byrd's execution and order the evidentiary hearing.

The magistrate declined that motion, but the matter was referred to the Ohio Supreme Court's Disciplinary Counsel for possible ethics violations.

As part of the prison intake process, Brewer completed a form that included a place for the inmate to give his version of his offenses.

However, he was confronted with an intake screening form dated August 23, 1983, in which he stated "my buddy killed this guy..." Despite the introduction of the intake psychologist's report, which stated that Brewer had said he was surprised when his buddy came out of the convenience store and announced that he had "wasted the dude", Brewer testified in federal court that he told the psychologist only that all three men had been convicted of aggravated murder and that Byrd was sentenced to death.

The 6th Circuit endorsed the magistrate's 171-page report of the week-long evidentiary hearing and rejected the habeas claim.

Among those opposing the execution was Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., a Columbus, Ohio native, special assistant to President John F. Kennedy and Pulitzer Prize-winning author.

Schlesinger noted in his letter that he was "a friend half a century ago of (U.S.) Sen. Robert A. Taft," the governor's grandfather.

Capital punishment, Schlesinger wrote, "should be reserved for cases where there is absolutely no shred or tremor of doubt .

Ironically, Byrd's lengthy appeals process thwarted his wish to bring the graphic nature of the death penalty home to Ohioans.