On May 24, 1976 Gaskins was tried on eight charges of murder and was found guilty on December 28, 1974. He was sentenced to be executed by electric chair, but when the South Carolina General Assembly changed its guidelines for the death penalty to comply with those of the United States Supreme Court, Gaskins could not be legally executed. He was held on Death Row at the South Carolina Correctional Institution.

He committed another murder while imprisoned there. The victim was Rudolph Tyner, who was imprisoned for murdering an elderly couple while robbing their store in the community of Burgess. Gaskins was paid by Tony Cimo to kill him. Cimo was the son of the murdered woman. Gaskins’ first efforts at killing Tyner failed, so he decided to use explosives. He fashioned what appeared to be a mobile telephone and slipped it to Tyner, explaining that they could communicate using it without interference from the guards. At a predetermined time, Gaskin and Tyner were to try out the telephones. When Tyner was holding the phone to his ear, Gaskins triggered the device, causing Tyner’s phone to explode, killing him. The phone was loaded with C-4 plastic explosive! Following this murder, he became known as the “meanest man in America.”

Gaskins was interviewed by journalist, Wilton Earle, who spent long hours documenting Gaskins’ life story. During these interviews, he confessed to having killed between 100 and 110 people. This number has never been proven.

Among the many murders claimed was that of twelve-year-old Margaret “Peg” Cuttino, whose father was a state senator of Sumter, South Carolina. Police have never been able to prove or disprove this claim by Gaskins.

In the biography, Final Truth, Gaskins claimed to have a special mind that gave him permission to kill!

He was also quoted and recorded as saying, 'I have walked the same path as God, by taking lives and making others afraid, I became God's equal. Through killing others, I became my own master. Through my own power I come to my own redemption..'

On September 6, 1991, at 1:10 a.m., Donald Gaskins was put to death in the South Carolina electric chair.