Gilbert Postelle
American man convicted of murder and executed
Gilbert Ray Postelle (June 22, 1986 – February 17, 2022) was an American mass murderer who was sentenced to death and executed for his involvement in a quadruple murder in Oklahoma. He was executed on February 17, 2022, by lethal injection.
Early life
Postelle was abandoned by his mother at a young age and later began using methamphetamine on a daily basis. Postelle was arrested at least eight times in Midwest City related to drug manufacturing and weapons complaints. His father, Earl Bradford "Brad" Postelle, had a 1996 drug conviction and, in 1999, was suspected of manufacturing methamphetamine in an old school bus behind his home. Brad Postelle was charged with endeavoring to manufacture meth and drug possession, but the charges later were dropped.
Crime
On May 30, 2005, Memorial Day, Postelle, his brother David Postelle, father Brad Postelle, and another man, Randall Wade Byus, shot and killed four people in a "blitz attack" at a home in Oklahoma City. The victims were Donnie Swindle, James Alderson, Terry Smith, and Amy Wright. Prior to the attack, Brad Postelle was involved in a motorcycle crash and was seriously injured, receiving a brain injury resulting in seizures. The shooting was motivated by Postelle's belief that Swindle was responsible for the motorcycle accident despite there being no evidence for his involvement.
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This entry incorporates text from “Gilbert Postelle” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.