Dr. L. Kay Gillespie was born in Idaho Falls, Idaho, on April 8, 1940. He received a B.A. in Political Science in 1965 and an M.S. in Sociology in 1969, both from Brigham Young University. He received his Ph.D. in Sociology from the University of Southern California in 1976. He worked as an Administrative Case Worker at the Ettie Lee Homes for Delinquent Boys in Los Angeles, California and Provo, Utah, from 1966-1968. In 1968, he worked at the Las Palmas Detention Center in Los Angeles, California in the Training Program for Foster Parents. From 1968-1969, he served as a Juvenile Probation Officer in Rexburg, Idaho before becoming a Cottage Supervisor at the Idaho State Youth Training Center in St. Anthony, Idaho, from 1969-1972. He was an Assistant Professor of Sociology at Ricks College in Rexburg, Idaho from 1968-1972, and a Sociology Instructor at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, California from 1973-1974. From 1974-2010, he was a Professor of Sociology and Criminal Justice at Weber State College. Some of the committees and boards Dr. Gillespie served on include the Governor’s Committee on Cancer Quackery (1975), the Utah Medical Association Committee on Unproven Health Practices (1975-1978), the Executive Board of the Big Brothers of Northern Utah (1977-1981), the Chairman of the Utah State Youth Development Center Advisory Board (1977-1978), and the Utah State Health Project Review Board (1981-1983). While on leave from Weber, he served as a member of the first full-time Utah State Board of Pardons in 1983 and was the Director of Training at the Utah State Division of Corrections in 1984. He served as president of the Utah Sociological Society from 1988-1989, and was a member of the American Society of Criminology, Society for the Study of Social Problems, Pacific Sociological Society, Western Society of Criminology, Phenomenological Sociology, and the Maconochie Society. He has published multiple books including Cancer Quackery: The Label of Quack and Its Relationship to Deviant Behavior (1979), Social Problems: Myths & Realities (1985), The Unforgiven: Utah’s Executed Men (1991), Dancehall Ladies: The Crimes and Executions of America’s Condemned Women (1997), and Inside the Death Chamber: Exploring Executions (2003).