Bio

Raymond Carl Kinnamon was born on November 20, 1941, in Houston, Harris County, Texas, to his 23-year-old father, Raymond Odell Kinnamon, and his 18-year-old mother, Sadie Leo Heaslet. Growing up in the local Texas region, Kinnamon's youth was severely fractured, and he ultimately dropped out of the traditional schooling system, though he later managed to secure a high school equivalent education by earning his GED. His formative years quickly became deeply entangled with the juvenile and adult penal systems, establishing a lifelong cycle of incarceration. 

As Kinnamon would later lament in his final public statement, he spent the vast majority of his developmental years institutionalized, explicitly noting that because he was primarily "raised in TDC" (the Texas Department of Criminal Justice), he missed out on acquiring a normal vocabulary and a conventional upbringing.By the time he reached adulthood, Kinnamon had transitioned into a full-time career criminal, alternating between brief stints as a construction worker and long stretches behind bars. 

His formal criminal record officially began in 1961 when he was roughly 20 years old. Over the next two decades, his life was defined by a rapid escalation of offenses that resulted in 17 to 18 separate felony convictions. His extensive rap sheet featured eight aggravated robberies, two robberies by assault, three burglaries, and four thefts. 

These serial offenses culminated in three separate, extensive prison terms and a collective total of 223 years in assessed prison sentences which he managed to serve concurrently before being paroled back into society. His early life of chronic institutionalization and habitual theft ultimately set the stage for his final, fatal December 1984 robbery spree in Houston.

Murder Story

On the evening of December 11, 1984, Raymond Carl Kinnamon was inside N.J.’s Lounge in Houston, Texas. He was one of several patrons seated at the bar. Witnesses later said he had been there for several hours, mostly sitting alone and sometimes playing a video game mounted on the bar. After “last call” was announced, Kinnamon appeared to leave with other customers, but he told bartender Jeannie Marriott that he needed to use the restroom.

When Kinnamon returned from the restroom, he was armed with a firearm. He ordered the employees and remaining customers to put their hands on the bar and not look at him. He then ordered Marriott to remove money from the cash register. Because no bag was available, the money was placed in waitress Sharon Bryson’s purse.

After taking the money, Kinnamon ordered the people inside the bar to walk single file toward the men’s restroom. Ronald Charles Longmire was near the end of the line. As the group moved, Kinnamon demanded jewelry and other property from the victims. He then asked Longmire what was in his pocket. Longmire replied that it was only his driver’s license. Moments later, shots were fired. One bullet struck Longmire in the back. Longmire was badly wounded and later died at the hospital.

During the confusion, waitress Sharon Bryson escaped through a rear exit and activated a burglar alarm. Marriott and another patron, Kenny Simmons, hid in a walk-in cooler. Police arrived soon afterward and found Longmire bleeding and disoriented inside the bar. Kinnamon fled with more than $1,500, including money taken from Longmire.

Witnesses later identified Kinnamon from a photo lineup. About two weeks after the murder, he was arrested at his Houston residence. He was also linked to another aggravated robbery committed in Houston shortly after the N.J.’s Lounge robbery. Kinnamon denied being the gunman and continued to claim innocence, but prosecutors relied on eyewitness identification and the facts of the robbery-murder.

On July 25, 1985, a Harris County jury convicted Kinnamon of capital murder for killing Ronald Longmire during the robbery. On July 30, 1985, he was sentenced to death. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the conviction in 1990, and later state and federal appeals were denied.

Kinnamon was executed by lethal injection on December 11, 1994, exactly ten years after the murder. He gave a long final statement, thanked several people, criticized capital punishment, and said he was not ready to die. He was pronounced dead after the lethal injection was administered