Stephen West executed: Final words of sobbing double murderer in electric chair

A 56-year-old man was put to death today for the double killing of a mother and daughter in the 1980s.

Stephen West sobbed as he sat in the electric chair before he was put to death in Tennessee, US, tonight.

He offered a few, brief final words referencing the Bible while he cried.

West was convicted of the fatal stabbing of Wanda Romines, 51, and her daughter Sheila, 15, in their home in 1986.

Execution witnesses tonight said he was 'very emotional' just before he was killed, with a veil covering his face when the current was switched on.

Stephen Michael West was put to death tonight (Tennessee Department of Correction)

Before he was executed at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution in Nashville, West was asked if he had any final words.

"In the beginning, God created man," he said, before pausing to sob.

"And Jesus wept," he added. "That is all."

After the execution, a statement was read out by one of the witnesses from West's lawyer.

He described the murderer as 'a man of faith', and his final words include extracts from the Bible.

In Genesis, the actual text is: "In the beginning God created Heaven and Earth", with the creation of Man coming several verses later.

The mother and daughter were killed, after Sheila was raped (WBIR)

"Jesus wept" is the shortest verse in the King James Bible, from the Gospel of John after the death of Lazarus.

The meaning is open to interpretation but many consider it to represent Jesus's compassion for suffering.

In more modern parlance though, the phrase is often used sarcastically to show a lack of sympathy for someone's apparent self pity.

West was convicted by a jury in 1987 of two counts of first-degree murder.

At the time of the mother and daughter killings West was 23 and his accomplice Ronnie Martin was 17.

West referenced the Bible in his final words (Moment RF)

The pair had been driving around drinking before going to the Romines' home.

When Wanda let them inside they raped raped Sheila, a classmate of Martin who had knocked back his advances at school, before stabbing mother and daughter to death.

Sheila was stabbed 17 times in the stomach during the gruesome killing and 14 of those wounds were consistent with “torture-type cuts".

Both victims had their hands bound behind their backs.