A man who killed a store owner by sawing at his neck with a pocketknife during a 1997 robbery became on Wednesday the 100th person executed in Virginia since capital punishment was reinstated three decades ago.

Robert Stacy Yarbrough was pronounced dead at 9:28 p.m. at Greensville Correctional Center in Jarratt. The 30-year-old was put to death by injection for the 1997 slaying of 77-year-old Cyril Hugh Hamby.

"Tell my kids I love them, and let's get it over with. Make people happy. Help celebrate the murder," Yarbrough said in his final words.
The U.S. Supreme Court and Gov. Timothy M. Kaine refused to block the execution earlier Wednesday.

Virginia ranks second to Texas, which has 406, in the number of executions since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated capital punishment in 1976. Virginia restarted its capital punishment program in 1982.

Corrections officials needed 17 minutes to insert the intravenous line. It took approximately 10 minutes for him to die.

"Everything proceeded normally, other than the delay siting the line," Corrections Department spokesman Larry Traylor said.

Yarbrough and former high school classmate Dominic Jackson Rainey waited at a picnic table across the road from Hamby's Store on May 8, 1997, until all the customers left. After locking the door behind them, they tied Hamby's hands behind his back with an extension cord and string and forced open the cash register.

Yarbrough asked Hamby twice where his guns were hidden, and when he didn't get an answer he put down his shotgun, took out a three-bladed "Uncle Henry" pocketknife and cut the front and back of Hamby's neck in a sawing motion as Hamby pleaded for him to stop. Medical experts estimate it may have taken 15 minutes for Hamby to bleed to death.

Yarbrough took Hamby's wallet, and the men grabbed some beer, wine and cigarettes and fled the store. Days later, they were arrested.

Yarbrough was convicted and sentenced to death in June of 1998. The Virginia Supreme Court demanded a second sentencing hearing because the jury was not told that Yarbrough would not be eligible for parole if sentenced to life in prison. The second jury also sentenced Yarbrough to death.

Rainey, who was 17 at the time and testified against Yarbrough, pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and was sentenced to 25 years in prison.

Yarbrough met with family members and his attorneys Wednesday, Traylor said. He did not request a spiritual adviser.

His last meal was fried chicken tenders and cheese pizza.

Hamby's family members attended the execution but did not want to comment.

Five executions were scheduled over two months in Virginia after a moratorium was lifted in April following the U.S. Supreme Court's finding that the method of lethal injection used in dozens of states was constitutional.

Kevin Green was executed in May. Kaine commuted triple killer Percy Walton's sentence days before his scheduled June 10 execution because of Walton's deteriorated mental state. Two other men - Kent Jermaine Jackson and Christopher Scott Emmett - are scheduled to be executed in July.