Brad Keith Sigmon Executed by Firing Squad in 2025 — His Final Meal, Last Words, and the Crime That Sent Him to Death Row

On March 7th, 2025, after more than 20 years on death row, Brad Keith Sigman was executed by firing squad. But to understand how he ended up strapped to a chair with a hood over his head, we have to go back way back. In 2001, Brad and Rebecca Becky Lark had been living together in her trailer for 3 years just outside a quiet patch of South Carolina.

 But things had turned bitter. Becky had reached her limit and told Brad it was over. No more fights, no more begging, no more him. She packed her things and moved into her parents’ trailer next door. Her father, David Lark, made it official. He handed Brad eviction papers and gave him two weeks to move out while Becky packed her things and temporarily moved in with her parents.

 But when she left, Brad didn’t take it well. He begged her to come back to try and work things out between them, but she refused. And when she didn’t change her mind, Brad did something worse. He started watching her, following her, staring at her front door from across the yard. He became convinced that she had met someone new. And that thought, true or not, drove him over the edge.

 About a week after Becky moved out, Brad was sitting in her trailer with his friend Eugene Stroo. They were drinking and smoking crack, and Brad told Eugene his master plan. The next morning after Becky left to take her kids to school, he was going to go next door, tie up her parents, and wait. And when she came back home, he would kidnap Becky and leave town.

 With her parents tied up, he figured he would be long gone before anyone noticed that something was wrong. But he had no idea what kind of damage he was about to cause. Becky’s mother, Glattis, never cared for restaurants on birthdays or Mother’s Day. She preferred to stay home, cooking enough food to feed an army.

 Fried chicken, roasts, macaroni, and cheese in a dented pot that had been passed around the family for years. The table was always full, and so was every plate. And her husband, David, was the kind of man who always apologized before bedtime, even if the argument wasn’t his to fix. He forgave easily, spoke gently, and meant it when he said he loved you.

Together, they were the heart of a close family with five kids, and grandkids were coming fast. But on April 27th, 2001, all of that was taken from them. Just after dawn, Brad set his plan into motion. When he saw Becky leave to take her children to school, he stepped outside. Eugene, who wanted nothing to do with his plan, quickly left.

 But Brad was determined. He grabbed a baseball bat from under the trailer, walked over to the Larks’ home, and went in. David Lark was in the kitchen while Glattis was in the living room. David sensed something and told his wife to bring him the gun, but she never got the chance. Brad struck first, swinging the bat at David’s head over and over.

 Then he chased Glattis into the living room and beat her, too. He went back and forth, first to David, then to Glattis, smashing their skulls until they stopped moving. They received nine brutal blows each. But it wasn’t quick. A medical examiner later said they lived for up to 5 minutes, gasping through blood as they died.

When they stopped moving, Brad took David’s gun and waited. He stood inside that blood soaked trailer, watching the driveway. When Becky returned, Brad jumped out, aimed the gun, and forced her into her own car. His plan was to drive off, switch cars, and head to North Carolina. But Becky was done with Brad and his behavior, and she wasn’t giving in that easily. She opened the door and ran.

 But Brad was on a mission. He wasn’t going to let her get away, and he fired. The bullet hit her, but it didn’t stop her. And at that moment, something in Brad cracked. The plan he had obsessed over was ruined and he knew it. He panicked, jumped into the car, and drove off, leaving Becky bleeding in the yard. She survived the attack, and somehow she managed to call for help.

 She told the officers what Brad had said, that he had killed her parents. The officers ran to the house, and inside they found her mother and father bludgeoned to death, their bodies dumped and left behind like trash. The manhunt began immediately, but Brad was already gone. Days passed and then he made a mistake that would eventually cost him his life. He called his mother.

But what Brad didn’t know was that she had already spoken to the police and she helped them track the call. Soon after he was arrested in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. When he was caught, there was no struggle, no fight, and he confessed quickly to the murder, to the attempted kidnapping, and to the shooting.

 He told them he had planned to kill Becky and then himself. But what kind of man does this, and what turned him into a killer? Brad Keith Sigman was born on November 12th, 1957 in South Carolina. And his mother, Virginia, was just 17 years old. He was the oldest of five, and the siblings came quickly, each born barely a year apart.

 Their father, Ronnie, was a military man, which meant they moved constantly. Brad’s early childhood was a blur of small towns, Taylor’s, Greer, and even a stretch in the Philippines after the youngest was born. But the home wasn’t safe. Ronnie drank, and when he drank, he beat Virginia. Brad, as the oldest, tried to protect her.

 The younger kids were left alone, but Brad took all the blows, stepping in when fists flew, shielding his mother and his siblings. Eventually, Virginia had enough and the marriage collapsed. But even after the divorce, Brad never got stability. Both parents remarried and Brad bounced between their homes, never really belonging in either.

Still, he did his best to hold it together. By 16, he was working while still in high school in Simpsonville, doing what he could to help raise his siblings. After the divorce, he became the adult by default, cooking meals, keeping the house running, picking up the slack his parents left behind. He never complained, but the strain left scars.

Then came the first break. At 18, he was arrested for armed robbery in nearby Greer. It was the first time his name showed up in a police file, but it certainly wouldn’t be the last. Just 9 weeks before he was supposed to graduate in 1977, Brad dropped out of school to get married. He and his wife moved to Manning and had a son.

 Family members later said Brad was kind, loving, and even gentle. His son, his parents, his siblings, and Virginia’s second husband all described him the same way. Someone who loved his family deeply, even if he couldn’t hold his life together. But as the years passed, Brad slipped further. His adult life unraveled into a cycle of arrests, mostly for DUI and DWI.

 He battled addiction, struggled with depression, and spiraled deeper into instability. Then came November 17th, 1990 when Brad showed up at his aranged wife’s house in Manning. They argued and he tried to break in. So, she called the police. But Brad didn’t back off, not even when the officers arrived.

 He was hostile, refused to leave, and the standoff escalated. A shootout broke out and Brad was shot in the stomach several times. His 12-year-old son, caught in the middle, took a bullet to the arm. Luckily, he survived and Brad was patched up at a hospital and released within a week. Then he vanished. He left Manning and drifted back to Greenville County.

 Besides already drinking heavily, he now started doing drugs as well and spiraled even further. That’s when he met Rebecca and he soon moved in with her. And that’s where he spent the rest of his life until the blood, the baseball bat, and the murders ended it all. After his arrest, the charges against him stacked up fast.

 Two counts of murder, burglary, kidnapping, grand lararseny, assault with intent to kill, and illegal firearm possession. But it was the murder and burglary charges that followed him to trial. In court, prosecutors didn’t hold back. They brought in medical experts who described what the bat had done to David and Glattis.

 Their skulls were fractured, and they both had defensive wounds. Both had tried to protect themselves. Both had suffered and both had died slowly, drowning in their own blood. Brad’s defense team didn’t deny his actions. They just wanted the jury to understand who he was before that night. They described a childhood marked by neglect and abandonment, years spent drifting from place to place, never really belonging.

 They said he was adapting to prison life, that he wasn’t violent behind bars, and that maybe, just maybe, he was more than the worst thing he had ever done. Brad testified, too. He said he was sorry for his actions. Now that he was sober, he could see the gravity of what he had done, and he said that he probably deserved to die.

 But in the end, none of it mattered. And on July 20th, 2002, Brad Keith Sigman was sentenced to die for the murders of David and Glattis Lark. For the next 20 years, Brad waited in a small death row cell while the state figured out how to carry out his sentence. South Carolina had stopped executing prisoners in 2011 after running out of the drugs needed for lethal injection.

 But that pause didn’t last forever. Lawmakers eventually stepped in and brought back the electric chair and added the firing squad as a backup. By 2024, Brad was told to choose, but none of the options felt humane. He said the electric chair might burn and cook him alive. However, lethal injection wasn’t better in his mind either.

 Not after watching Marian Bowman die with fluid in his lungs, gasping for air after two doses of penttoarbatl. So Brad picked the firing squad. He knew what it meant. Bullets that would shatter his ribs, rip through his heart, maybe even snap his spine. But in his eyes, it was quicker, less cruel than the other methods.

 Before the execution, his ex-girlfriend Rebecca spoke publicly. “I miss my mama and daddy,” she said. “I didn’t get to see them grow old. I didn’t get to take care of them. My brothers and sisters, we missed that.” Then on March 7th, 2025, the moment finally came. For his final meal, Brad requested four pieces of fried chicken from KFC with green beans, mashed potatoes, biscuits, cheesecake, and a sweet tea.

 He asked for enough to share with other inmates, but reports varied as to whether this request was granted. At 6:00 p.m., Brad was strapped into the execution chair inside the Broad River Correctional Institution. He said he wanted his final statement to be one of love and a calling to my fellow Christians to help us end the death penalty.

 “An eye for an I was used as justification to the jury for seeking the death penalty,” he said. At that time, I was too ignorant to know how wrong that was. Why? Because we no longer live under the Old Testament law, but now live under the New Testament. He then quoted several Bible passages that emphasize forgiveness and the law. Nowhere does God in the New Testament give man the authority to kill another man, he said.

 After his final statement, a hood was placed over his head and a target strapped over his heart. He made several heavy breaths during the 2 minutes from when the hood was placed over his head to the shots being fired. The execution was carried out by a firing squad armed with rifles loaded with 308 Winchester rounds, ammunition known for its devastating impact.

 and they are designed to fragment on contact. A direct hit to the heart could end a life in seconds. In South Carolina, they don’t use blanks. All three rifles were loaded. The three volunteers stand behind a wall with a small opening not visible to witnesses. And after the warden reads the execution order, the officers fire.

The curtains opened at 6:01 p.m. and at 6:05 the trio fired from 15 ft away without any warning. Witnesses watched in silence as Brad faced the firing squad, his jaw strapped in place with a sling. Just before the rifles cracked, some believed he mouthed the words, “I’m okay.” to his attorney.

 Then came the shots. His arms jerked tight the moment the bullets hit and the paper targets snapped clean off his chest. For a second, it looked like he was still breathing. One, maybe two shallow pulls of air while a dark red bloom spread beneath the wound. His chest shifted slightly. Then everything went still. About a minute later, a doctor stepped forward, leaned in, and checked for signs of life.

 90 seconds passed before he looked up and at 6:08 p.m. he gave the word. Brad Keith Sigman was pronounced dead. Brad was 67 years old, the oldest person executed in South Carolina since the death penalty returned.