By JIM BUTLER

District Attorney Phillip Terrell plans to take every step available and necessary to realize the execution of Darrell Robinson.

Louisiana has not carried out an involuntary execution since 2002 but Terrell noted at a media briefing Thursday that legislation this year has made capital punishment a much more likely event.

Robinson, convicted of the 1996 murder of three adults and an infant in the Poland community, has essentially exhausted his state appellate rights.

The Louisiana Supreme Court, in a relatively extraordinary action, granted a motion to rehear Robinson’s case in early summer this year after vacating his conviction in a January ruling.

On rehearing, four of the seven justices earlier this month reversed the January ruling, reinstating Robinson’s verdict and sentence.

The U.S. Supreme Court two decades ago declined to review the case.

Terrell was joined Thursday by Sheriff Mark Wood and retired Sheriff William Earl Hilton in condemning Robinson and applauding the court.

Hilton, sheriff for 20 years and in law enforcement 50, called the crime the most vicious he had encountered, saying he looks forward to the end of the execution.

“He done something that was unbelievable,” said Wood referring to the killings, which Terrell said were done because Robinson wanted to experience what it would be like to kill someone.

Wood and Hilton praised Terrell for his persistence in seeking and realizing reinstatement of the jury’s unanimous verdict.

The Robinson case and another Rapides capital case precede Terrell’s 10 years as DA. The late Charles Wagner was district attorney at the time.

Terrell’s late father, “Pete,” a retired state trooper, was Wagner’s chief investigator for some time.

The other capital case on Terrell’s plate is that of Larry Roy, who in 1993, a jury concluded, killed two people in Cheneyville and attempted to kill three others. He was convicted and sentenced to death in 1994.