Last Updated: May 1, 2025
On June 18, 1895, Jabez L. Woodbridge of Wethersfield patented an automated gallows. The object of Patent No. 541,409 was “to provide an apparatus or machine by means of which the penalty of capital punishment may be inflicted with certainty.” Rather than traditional gallows where the person falls down, the automatic gallows yanks the person upwards.
Woodbridge served as Warden of the Wethersfield Prison from 1893-1899. At its opening in September 1827, the newly constructed Connecticut State Prison housed 81 inmates previously held at Newgate Prison in Granby. The prison in Wethersfield closed in 1963 when a new facility in Somers opened.
The final execution in Connecticut using any method was in 2005. In 2012, Connecticut abolished the death penalty for all future crimes. Eleven people, however, remained on death row for crimes committed prior to 2012. After the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled in 2015 that the death penalty violated the state constitution, all eleven death row inmates were resentenced to imprisonment for life without parole.
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