LUCASVILLE, Ohio — John W. Byrd Jr. went to his death Tuesday morning the same way he had lived for the past 19 years.

        The convicted killer portrayed himself as a victim, criticized state officials for their “cowardice” and refused to publicly admit any role in the slaying of a Colerain Township convenience store clerk in 1983.

        Mr. Byrd, who had claimed innocence for years, was executed by lethal injection at 10:09 a.m.

        In a defiant final statement, Mr. Byrd expressed love for his family and contempt for those he blamed for his “state-sanctioned murder.”

        He made no mention of Monte Tewksbury, the man he was convicted of stabbing to death during the 1983 robbery of a King Kwik store.

        “I'd like to tell my family that I love them and to stay strong,” Mr. Byrd said after he was strapped onto a gurney in the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility's Death House. “The corruption of the state will fall.”

        Mr. Byrd predicted that Gov. Bob Taft, the man who refused to grant him clemency, “will not be re-elected.”

        “The rest of you,” Mr. Byrd said, “you know where you can go.”

        Mr. Tewksbury's widow, Sharon, said the execution brought relief — but no joy — to her family. She has said Mr. Byrd threatened her and her children years ago in a letter he mailed from prison.

        “The violence done to Monte will no longer threaten his wife and children,” said Mrs. Tewksbury, who chose to remain at her home in Mason rather than witness the execution. “Because of where he is and who he is, I believe Monte is at a place where he could speak of forgiveness and mercy for the man who took his life.

        “I cannot.”

        Mr. Byrd's death came just hours after his attorneys lost a last-ditch bid to spare his life with a late appeal to the U.S. 6th Circuit Court of Appeals.

        After learning the court would not stop his execution, Mr. Byrd calmly walked into the death chamber. He did not resist as prison staff strapped him to the gurney and attached the intravenous lines that would carry the lethal mix of chemicals into his bloodstream.

        Mr. Byrd wore a white T-shirt and blue pants with a red stripe down the side. He refused a breakfast of pancakes, grits and apple juice. Instead, he drank a can of grape soda and smoked Newport cigarettes.

        About 100 anti-death penalty protesters — many of them from Cincinnati — gathered outside the prison in the hours before the execution. They chanted, prayed and sang, holding signs aloft.

        Three of Mr. Tewksbury's friends and relatives were among the 14 witnesses who watched Mr. Byrd die. Mr. Tewksbury's niece, Kristi Pemberton, said she felt sorry for Mr. Byrd as she watched him on the gurney, even though she has no doubt he deserved to die.

        “This was something that needed to be done,” Ms. Pemberton said. “I feel strongly about that.”

        She said she wished she would have been allowed to speak to Mr. Byrd in the death chamber. “I would have said, "I hope you made the right decision in the last few moments of your life,'” she said.

        Mr. Byrd's sister, Kim Hamer, said her family would continue to fight to prove her brother's innocence. She said one of Mr. Byrd's co-defendants, John Brewer, is the one who stabbed Mr. Tewksbury.

        Mr. Brewer has claimed to be the killer, but prosecutors accuse him of lying to help Mr. Byrd. Several courts have reviewed Mr. Brewer's claims and found him to be unbelievable.

        “The truth will come out,” a sobbing Ms. Hamer said after the execution. “They murdered my brother. They murdered the wrong man.”

        Ms. Hamer and her mother spent several hours with Mr. Byrd Monday night and Tuesday morning in the prison's Death House. She said they laughed, cried and talked about their lives together. When she embraced her brother while saying goodbye, Ms. Hamer said, “I didn't want to let go.”

        “Johnny,” she told him, “you'll always be with me.”

        “Our spirits will always be together,” she recalled her brother saying. “They can't kill us all.”

        In Mr. Byrd's final hours, he spoke several times to friends, relatives and his “spiritual adviser,” a minister he met in prison a year ago. He ate a T-bone steak with A-1 sauce for dinner, smoked cigarettes and watched television.

        The minister, Pat Hanna, said he and Mr. Byrd read the Bible together late Monday. “He had an extreme, deep spiritual faith,” the Rev. Mr. Hanna said. “He always said, "I'm a child of God.'”

        A few hours before the execution, Mr. Byrd sent a message to the Rev. Mr. Hanna stating that he was “in a state of grace.”

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