On May 22nd, 2025, after almost 35 years on death row, Oscar Franklin Smith was executed by lethal injection in Tennessee. But before we talk about his final moments, let’s look at what got him on death row in the first place. It was just after 11:20 p.m. on Sunday, October 1st, 1989, when a 911 call came into the Metropolitan Nashville Police Department.

The voice on the line was young and terrified. “Help me!” cried a boy, later ident ident ident identified as 13-year-old Jason Bernett. In the background, the voice of his older brother, Chad, screamed out in panic. “Frank, no! God, help me!” Then came silence. Jason managed to say one last thing before the line went dead.

 324 Ludy Street. Then the call was cut off. Officers were dispatched immediately and just 5 minutes later they drove into the quiet Woodbine neighborhood. But when they knocked at the door of number 324, no one answered. From the outside, nothing looked out of place. The lights were off and everything seemed still.

 So they left again, assuming it was a false alarm. But inside that house, horror was waiting, and it wouldn’t be discovered until the next afternoon. At 300 p.m. the following day, officers returned after a call from a neighbor. And this time, they went inside. What they found was devastating. Three bodies, Judy Robert Smith and her two sons, 16-year-old Chad Bernett and 13-year-old Jason Bernett.

 The scene in the kitchen was complete chaos. Furniture had been overturned, and blood was smeared across the floor and walls. Chad’s body lay face up on the tile. The telephone had been ripped off the wall explaining why the 911 call had cut off so suddenly. Nearby, investigators found an all, a sharp metal tool normally used for punching holes in leather or wood.

That tool had been turned into a weapon. Chad had been shot three times, once in the shoulder, once in the chest, and once just above his left eye. The last two were fired at point blank range, and those were the ones that killed him. But that wasn’t all. His body showed signs of a brutal struggle.

 He’d been stabbed multiple times in the chest, the back, and the abdomen. His neck had been slashed, and his hands were torn with defensive wounds. He fought back, but it wasn’t enough. In the front bedroom, Judy was found on her back with blood spattered across the wall. She’d been shot, too, in the arm and the neck. That second shot was fired from close range just 2 ft away and it shattered her spine.

 She was paralyzed instantly and death came soon after. But the killer wasn’t finished. Her neck had been slashed as well. And just like Chad, she’d been stabbed multiple times with a knife and what appeared to be the same alllike weapon. Jason’s body was found near the foot of the bed. He hadn’t been shot, but the injuries were just as brutal.

Defensive cuts covered his hands. His neck was slashed, and he’d been stabbed in the chest and stomach. Two of those wounds had pierced major veins, and he was found with his hands on his small intestine, which was sticking out of his abdomen. According to the medical examiner, Jason bled out slowly, and it took minutes for him to die.

 By the time police returned to the house, all three victims had been dead for at least 12 hours, and the scene inside was pure devastation. There were no signs of forced entry, but the back door had been left open. Inside the house, a kitchen table leg had been snapped clean off, and a 22 caliber shell casing was found in the den.

 There were bullet holes in the walls of both the bedroom and the den. And ballistic experts later confirmed the bullets pulled from Judy and Chad came from the same gun. A trail of blood led from the den down the hallway into the kitchen. But what made it even more disturbing was what was left behind and what wasn’t.

 The gun and knife were gone, but in the bedroom they found a different weapon. A bloodcovered all left behind in the bedroom. And then there was the bloody palm print on the bed sheet next to Judy’s body. What caught their attention most wasn’t just the blood, it was the shape. The print was missing two fingers.

 And that detail pointed them in one direction. Oscar Franklin Smith, Judy’s estranged husband, a man who had lost those same two fingers years earlier in a work accident. But who exactly was the man known as Frank? And why would he do this? Frank was one of seven children born in Ohio to Oscar Earl and Florence Smith. And at some point during his early years, the family packed up and moved south to Robertson County, just 30 miles north of Nashville.

 It wasn’t anything glamorous, but he eventually found steady work with a maintenance company in Leverne. That’s where his life crossed paths with Judith Lynn Robberts, a waitress at a Waffle House with two sons from a previous marriage, Chad and Jason. Frank had kids of his own, too. Laura, 18, and Merl, 15, both living with his parents nearby in Pleasant View.

Frank and Judy married in 1985, and a year later they welcomed twin boys together, Chris and Casey. It looked like a fresh start, a blended family trying to make it work. But whatever peace they had was short-lived, because just a few years later, that same home on Ludy Street would become the scene of one of the most brutal crimes in Nashville’s history.

 By June of 1989, the marriage had fallen apart. A divorce was in motion and the fight over the twins had turned bitter. Judy had been granted temporary custody while Frank saw the boys every other weekend. But behind the paperwork and legal filings, something darker was brewing. Judy, Chad, and Jason had all confided in others that they were afraid of Frank, and they had every reason to be. That summer, the danger became real.

During a visit to Frank’s trailer on his family’s land in Pleasant View, things turned violent. He bit Jason on the back and held a gun to his head. Then he kicked Judy and the older boys out, threatening her. Don’t touch the car. Don’t take the twins. And don’t call the police. Or he’d kill her.

 But it didn’t stop there. In August, when Judy came back to collect her things, Frank attacked again. He tied her up, raped her, held a knife to her throat, and told her she was going to die. By the time of the murders, warrants for aggravated assault had already been filed. But the violence didn’t slow down. It escalated.

 He began calling her constantly at home and at work, and her co-workers overheard the threats. One of them remembered it clearly. Frank said he’d shoot her. He said he’d stab her. And he said he’d kill Chad and Jason, too. because in his eyes, she treated them better than his own sons. In the final weeks before the murders, the threats turned even colder.

While picking up the twins, Frank looked Judy’s father in the eye and said, “You tell Judy, I’ve been playing with her with kid gloves, but now the gloves are coming off,” and he meant it. Another time, he made it even clearer. If she ever left him, he’d kill her. Then, investigators discovered something else.

Frank had taken out life insurance policies on Judy and on her two older sons, and the picture started to come together. From the beginning, the evidence pointed straight at Frank. But at trial, it was the bloody palm print that prosecutors leaned on most. Crime scene investigators testified it matched Frank’s hand exactly, especially since two fingers were missing, just like the print at the scene.

But years later, a fingerprint expert hired by Frank’s legal team challenged it. He said the original analysis was flawed, rushed, and in his opinion, there was no way to say for sure that print belonged to Frank. Still, the jury didn’t need long. On July 26th, 1990, Oscar Franklin Smith was found guilty of capital murder, and 2 days later, they sentenced him to death.

 His first execution date was set for December 3rd, 1990, but appeals kicked in quickly and put everything on hold. Since then, Frank has spent decades on death row at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution, and his legal team never stopped fighting. For years, they filed motions, challenged evidence, and pleaded for more time, but in the end, every request was denied.

 A new execution date was set, April 21st, 2022. As the execution date approached, Frank chose not to select a method of execution. Tennessee law allows inmates sentenced before 1999 to pick between the electric chair and lethal injection. If they don’t choose, the state goes with lethal injection by default.

 For what he believed would be his final meal, Frank requested a double bacon cheeseburger, deep dish apple pie, and vanilla bean ice cream. He enjoyed every bite of it, like a man making peace with his end. But just hours before the execution, everything changed. Governor Bill Lee issued a lastminute reprieve.

 He announced that a critical error had been discovered in the lethal injection protocol. The chemicals hadn’t been properly tested for endotoxins, a step required to ensure they were safe to use. And because of that, Frank’s execution was called off. Not just his, but every scheduled execution in Tennessee for the rest of the year.

 For the next two years, the Department of Correction tore the system apart and rebuilt it, eventually settling on a new method, a single drug protocol using pentobarbatl. And that change reopened the door for executions to resume. For the fourth time in 35 years, Frank faced an execution date. This time it was set for May 22nd, 2025.

 And once again, just like in 2022, he was allowed to choose a final meal. This time, Frank requested hot dogs, tater tots, and apple pie with vanilla ice cream. Under the state’s updated protocol, the meal was delivered the night before the execution and had to be finished by midnight. On the morning of his execution, Frank lay strapped to the gurnie, his hands still and eyes open.

His spiritual adviser stood nearby, softly praying and singing the hymn, I’ll fly away. At 10:32 a.m., the curtain separating the execution chamber from the witness room was drawn back. In those final moments, Frank spoke quietly with the adviser. “I didn’t kill her,” he said.

 Two IV lines had been placed in Frank’s right arm. When asked for his final words, he took his time speaking for nearly 3 minutes. “Somebody needs to tell the governor the justice system doesn’t work.” He said, “He’s the last word, the last person to give justice where justice is needed. Too many innocent people are being killed.” His tone hardened. “He needs to quit.

 Get a backbone,” he said. “Our justice system is broken, and he has the power to stop this.” He looked out toward the witnesses. “We have more men waiting to die at Riverbend. I won’t be the first, and I won’t be the last.” As the pentobarbatl began flowing through the IV lines, Frank kept speaking, but his voice grew weaker. By 10:38 a.m.

, he was struggling to form words, then stopped speaking altogether. His stomach was rising and falling slowly, and it looked like he fell asleep. At 10:47 a.m., he was declared dead. Oscar Franklin Smith was 75 years old.