Michael J. Lebedda

Michael J. Lebedda, an officer with the Munhall Borough Police Department, was shot and killed on November 17, 1917, while attempting to arrest Jack Thompson and two other men after they had robbed a man in Duquesne. The three assailants fled.

Thompson was arrested in North Carolina in May 1919. At trial, he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death in December 1919.

Before he could be executed, Thompson died of tuberculosis in the Allegheny County Jail on April 7, 1920.

Author: Bill Lofquist

I am a sociologist and death penalty scholar at the State University of New York at Geneseo. I am also a Pittsburgh native. My present research focuses on the history of the death penalty in Allegheny County (Pittsburgh), Pa. View all posts by Bill Lofquist