Troy Leon Gregg was born on April 29, 1948, in the United States and would become one of the most historically significant figures in modern American capital punishment law. By the early 1970s, Gregg had a troubled personal history and lived a transient lifestyle, relying on hitchhiking and occasional work while traveling across several states. His life intersected with the criminal justice system in a way that would make his name forever associated with the reinstatement of the death penalty in the United States.

On November 21, 1973, Gregg and an accomplice, Dennis Weaver, were hitchhiking when they were picked up by two men, Fred Edward Simmons and Bob Durwood Moore. At some point during the journey, Gregg shot and killed both men with the intent to rob them. He admitted to the killings during his subsequent trial, stating that the murders were committed so that he could take their car and money. Gregg and Weaver were later apprehended and charged with capital murder and armed robbery.

Gregg’s case became a pivotal legal battle in U.S. history. After the Supreme Court’s 1972 decision in Furman v. Georgia struck down existing death penalty statutes nationwide for being arbitrary and discriminatory, states revised their laws to address constitutional concerns. Georgia’s new capital punishment statute introduced a bifurcated trial process — separating the guilt and sentencing phases — and required juries to weigh specific aggravating and mitigating factors before imposing death. Gregg’s conviction and death sentence were the first to be reviewed under this new legal framework.

In Gregg v. Georgia (1976), the U.S. Supreme Court upheld Gregg’s death sentence by a 7–2 majority, ruling that Georgia’s revised statute met constitutional requirements. The landmark decision effectively reinstated the death penalty in the United States, marking Gregg as the first person sentenced to death under the new system whose punishment was affirmed by the high court. This ruling set the precedent for modern capital sentencing and shaped the future of death penalty jurisprudence in America.

Following his conviction and death sentence in 1974, Troy Leon Gregg was incarcerated on death row at Georgia State Prison in Reidsville, one of the most secure facilities in the state. He spent the next six years awaiting execution. During this time, Gregg continued to file legal appeals, but none were successful. Despite the gravity of his sentence, Gregg remained determined to escape.

On July 28, 1980, Gregg and three other death row inmates — Timothy McCorquodale, Johnny L. Johnson, and David Jarrell — executed the first successful death row escape in Georgia’s history. They disguised themselves in uniforms resembling those worn by correctional officers, sawed through the bars of their cells and a window, and used a fire escape to exit the facility. A getaway vehicle had been planted in the visitors’ parking lot by one of the escapees’ relatives. The prison staff did not realize they were missing until Gregg himself telephoned a newspaper to explain the reasons behind their escape.

However, Gregg’s freedom was short-lived. Within 24 hours, he was dead. Reports of his final hours remain murky, but the most widely accepted account suggests that Gregg stopped at a biker bar in North Carolina after his escape. Witnesses claimed that he was heavily intoxicated and attempted to sexually assault a waitress, which led to a violent altercation. Members of a motorcycle gang allegedly attacked him, beat him severely, and suffocated him before dumping his body in the nearby Catawba River. Other reports contend that Gregg may have been killed in a fight with fellow escapee Timothy McCorquodale and a biker named James Cecil Horne, a member of the Outlaws Motorcycle Club.

Gregg’s autopsy confirmed that he died by homicide due to suffocation and swelling. Horne was charged with Gregg’s murder, and another man, William Flamont, faced charges as an accessory after the fact. Both cases were dismissed due to insufficient evidence. The three remaining escapees were captured three days later in a dilapidated house owned by Flamont.

The fallout from Gregg’s escape was significant. Georgia prison officials, embarrassed by the breach of security, accelerated existing plans to relocate death row inmates to a more modern and secure facility — the Georgia Diagnostic and Classification State Prison in Jackson. The case also highlighted deficiencies in prison management and raised questions about how death row inmates were supervised.

Gregg’s co-escapees faced varied fates. Timothy McCorquodale was executed in 1987 for the 1974 murder of Donna Dixon, while Johnny L. Johnson and David Jarrell continue to serve life sentences for their respective murders committed in the 1970s.

Troy Leon Gregg’s story remains one of the most unusual and historically significant in American criminal history. He was not only the central figure in the Supreme Court decision that revived the death penalty but also the rare condemned prisoner whose life ended violently before the state could carry out its sentence — a fugitive from justice who became a homicide victim himself.