Was Basso Batty or Just Plain Bad?

Lawyers for Suzanne Basso, executed tonight by the state of Texas, tried to save their client with last-minute appeals that claimed the woman was mentally unsound. Over the years, Basso did all she could to foster that belief. She spoke in strange voices in court, and also claimed to be blind and paralyzed. She once accused a prison nurse of trying to kill her by smuggling a deadly snake into her hospital room inside a book about Roy Rogers. Basso also told people that she was a triplet, that she had once worked for New York's governor, and that she and Nelson Rockefeller had been romantically involved.

So those "mentally unsound" claims might have some merit after all.

What's undisputed, however, is that Basso killed a man named Louis Musso as part of a plot to steal his insurance money and social security benefits. (Can you imagine if she had strangled him with one of those cowboy ropes and committed the crime at one of the gas stations owned by Exxon? The headline would've read "Basso Kills Musso with Lasso at Esso.")

Since Texas no longer allows special last meal requests, executed inmates are fed the same food as everyone else in their unit. For her last meal, Suzanne Basso had baked chicken, fish, boiled eggs, carrots, green beans, and sliced bread.