Arthur Lucas, originally from the U.S.

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 state of Georgia

Georgia (U.S. state)

Georgia is a state located in the southeastern United States. It was established in 1732, the last of the original Thirteen Colonies. The state is named after King George II of Great Britain. Georgia was the fourth state to ratify the United States Constitution, on January 2, 1788...

, was one of the two last people to be executed in Canada

Canada

Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...

, on December 11, 1962. Lucas had been convicted of the murder

Murder

Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...

 of an undercover

Undercover

Being undercover is disguising one's own identity or using an assumed identity for the purposes of gaining the trust of an individual or organization to learn secret information or to gain the trust of targeted individuals in order to gain information or evidence...

 narcotics agent from Detroit. The murder took place in Toronto

Toronto

Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the largest city in Canada. It is located in Southern Ontario on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A relatively modern city, Toronto's history dates back to the late-18th century, when its land was first purchased by the British monarchy from...

.
Lucas, along with fellow prisoner Ronald Turpin

Ronald Turpin

On December 10, 1962 Ronald Turpin, 29, was one of the two last people to be executed in the Dominion of Canada. The other prisoner was Arthur Lucas who was executed alongside Turpin at the Toronto Jail. Turpin had been convicted of the murder of Metropolitan Toronto police officer Frederick Nash...

 was executed at the Toronto (Don) Jail

Don Jail

The Toronto Jail is a provincial jail for remanded offenders in the city of Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is located in the Riverdale neighbourhood on Gerrard Street East near its intersection with Broadview Avenue. It gets its nickname from the nearby Don River...

 by hanging

Hanging

Hanging is the lethal suspension of a person by a ligature. The Oxford English Dictionary states that hanging in this sense is "specifically to put to death by suspension by the neck", though it formerly also referred to crucifixion and death by impalement in which the body would remain...

, the only form of capital punishment

Capital punishment

Capital punishment, the death penalty, or execution is the sentence of death upon a person by the state as a punishment for an offence. Crimes that can result in a death penalty are known as capital crimes or capital offences. The term capital originates from the Latin capitalis, literally...

 ever used in post-Confederation Canada. In 1976, capital punishment for murder was removed from Canada's Criminal Code

Criminal Code of Canada

The Criminal Code or Code criminel is a law that codifies most criminal offences and procedures in Canada. Its official long title is "An Act respecting the criminal law"...

, but could still be used under the National Defence Act until 1998. When both men were informed that they would likely be the last people ever to hang in Canada, Lucas said, "Some consolation".

Chaplain

Chaplain

Traditionally, a chaplain is a minister in a specialized setting such as a priest, pastor, rabbi, or imam or lay representative of a religion attached to a secular institution such as a hospital, prison, military unit, police department, university, or private chapel...

Cyrill Everitt attended the double hanging and in 1986, shortly before his death, he revealed that Lucas' head was "nearly torn right off" because the hangman had miscalculated the man's weight.