While this is essentially the story of my time working with and for the Texas Department of Criminal Justice, first as a journalist and then as a spokesperson, it could not have been written without my dear friend and former colleague Larry Fitzgerald, whose thoughts appear throughout. As such, I must thank Ed Hancox, whose documentary about Larry for the BBC (The Man Who Witnessed 219 Executions) was the germ of this book and whose interviews, which he kindly shared with me, proved invaluable. In total, Larry and I witnessed almost 500 executions, many of them together. He was my mentor, a wonderful man, and will always be the face of the Texas prison system. This is Larry’s story, as much as it is mine.
Michelle Lyons,
May 2018