The last prisoner to be executed in Virginia using this drug cocktail was Ricky Gray, who was executed in January 2017. Morva is currently the last person in the United States to be executed under a Democratic governor. William Morva lived near Midlothian, Virginia until his father, Charles, retired and moved the family to Blacksburg. Charles Morva worked as a substitute teacher at Blacksburg High School and barista at a local coffee shop until moving back to the Richmond area with his wife Elizabeth. Christina Garnder, who attended high school with Morva, reported that he had a difficult relationship with his father. In 2000, he dropped out of high school and subsequently became a fixture in the Virginia Tech Community. In April 2004, Charles Morva died of cancer. His son's friends believe he did not know how to deal with the death of his father and observed a spiraling decline in his behavior. Before his initial arrest in 2005, William Morva had garnered a reputation as a drifter without a fixed permanent address. A self-professed survivalist, he was almost always without shoes, ate only raw meat, berries and pine cones, and spoke of spending nights in the woods around Blacksburg. Many who knew him began questioning his mental state. On August 18, 2005, William and another young man, both armed and wearing masks, approached the Blacksburg Deli Mart but left because the store was closed and locked. The clerk, still inside, phoned the police. The Blacksburg police later that night arrested William for attempted armed robbery. A year later, while in jail awaiting trial, William was taken to Montgomery Regional Hospital on August 20, 2006 for a sprained ankle and wrist. After using a hospital bathroom, he knocked deputy Russell Quesenberry unconscious using a metal toilet-paper container. He took the deputy's gun and shot Derrick McFarland, a hospital security guard who was running to the deputy's aid. McFarland died from his wounds. This initiated a manhunt for Morva, who on the morning of August 21, 2006, shot and killed Montgomery County sheriff's deputy Cpl. Eric Sutphin on the Huckleberry Trail near the Virginia Tech Campus. Sutphin had been an officer for 13 years and had survived a prior shooting in May 2003, which killed officer Scott Hylton, leading Sutphin to quit the police force. Sutphin returned, however, after just six months away despite making much more money as a modular home salesman. He was survived by his wife Tamara and his nine-year-old twin daughters.