Duncan McKenzie

Duncan Peder McKenzie Jr. (October 5, 1951 – May 10, 1995) was convicted of the murder of a Conrad, Montana schoolteacher named Lana Harding on January 21, 1974. After his conviction in March 1975, he was on death row for twenty years, receiving eight stays of execution. His ninth stay of execution was denied by the United States courts of appeals. McKenzie was executed on May 10, 1995. He was the first person executed in Montana since 1943, and also the first ever U.S. death row inmate to spend twenty years or more on death row and still eventually be executed. He is one of only three people to have been executed in Montana since the reinstatement of the death penalty. He was the only person of the three to be executed involuntarily. Background McKenzie was born on October 5, 1951, in Chicago, Illinois. He was also widowed. Crime overview He was convicted of the murder, rape, and death by asphyxia of Lana Harding. He was sentenced to death for aggravated kidnapping. The crime was committed on January 21, 1974, in the early morning. Harding was a schoolteacher in a small one-classroom schoolhouse and members of the community raised concerns of her well being when she did not arrive at the school and her shoes were left in the driveway.