He worked for the Rutherford family and lived in their basement for about a year, and then he moved to a cabin behind the house of a man named Emmett Wells.

[citation needed] Bethea's first run-in with the law happened in 1935, when he was charged with breach of the peace and then fined $20.

Since the value of the purses exceeded $25, Bethea was convicted of a felony, grand larceny, and consequently sentenced to one year in the Kentucky State Penitentiary at Eddyville.

[2] He arrived there on June 1, 1935, and his prison physical exam information describes him as 5 ft. 4+3⁄8 inches (1.635 m) tall and weighing 128 pounds (58 kg).

During the early morning of June 7, 1936, Bethea entered the home of Lishia Rarick Edwards on East Fifth Street[3] by climbing onto the roof of an outbuilding next door.

The crime was discovered late that morning after the Smith family, who lived downstairs, noticed they had not heard Edwards stirring in her room.

On the Wednesday following the discovery of the murder, Burt "Red" Figgins was working on the bank of the Ohio River, when he observed Bethea lying under some bushes.

By the time Faith had returned to the spot on the river bank, Bethea had moved to the nearby Koll's Grocery.

The police played along with the fabricated name, fearing a mob would develop if residents were to learn that they had captured Bethea.

Judge Forrest A. Roby of the Daviess Circuit Court ordered the sheriff to transport Bethea to the Jefferson County Jail in Louisville.

[5] Under Kentucky law, the grand jury could not convene until June 22, and the prosecutor charged Bethea solely with rape.

[4] Bethea was never charged with the remaining crimes of theft, robbery, burglary, giving a false name to police, or murder.

The defense subpoenaed four witnesses: Maddox, Ladd Moorman, Willie Johnson (a supposed accomplice given Bethea's statements), and Allen McDaniel.

The prosecutor still presented the state's case to the jury in spite of the guilty plea, requesting a death penalty for Bethea.

In his opening statement, Commonwealth's Attorney Herman Birkhead said, "This is one of the most dastardly, beastly, cowardly crimes ever committed in Daviess County.

[2] They worked pro bono to challenge the sentence, which they saw as their ethical duty for the indigent defendant who could not pay standard legal fees.

Justice Thomas refused to let them file the appeal, on the grounds that the trial court record was incomplete since it only included the judge's ruling.

On August 5, a hearing was held at the Federal Building in Louisville before United States District Judge Elwood Hamilton.

Arthur L. Hash, a former Louisville police officer, offered his services free of charge to perform the execution.

Rainey Bethea's last meal consisted of fried chicken, pork chops, mashed potatoes, pickled cucumbers, cornbread, lemon pie, and ice cream, which he ate at 4:00 p.m. on August 13 in Louisville.

At the Daviess County Jail, professional hangman Phil Hanna of Epworth, Illinois, visited Bethea and instructed him to stand on the X that would be marked on the trapdoor.

[citation needed] He wanted his body to be sent to his sister in South Carolina so that she could arrange for him to be interred next to his father, but against these wishes, he was buried in a pauper's grave at the Rosehill Elmwood Cemetery in Owensboro.

[citation needed] The spot where the scaffold stood (approximately 37.775248° -87.116462°) is now part of a drop-off/pick-up lane in front of the Owensboro Convention Center.

However, the trial judges in two separate Kentucky rape cases ordered that the hangings of John "Pete" Montjoy and Harold Van Venison be conducted privately.

The last person ever legally hanged in Kentucky was Harold Van Venison, a 33-year-old African-American singer, who was privately executed in Covington on June 3, 1938.