Pope in clemency appeal for US death row killer

Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz of Louisville presented Governor Steve Beshear with a letter written on the Pope’s behalf by Archbishop Pietro Sambi, the papal nuncio to the United States.

It asks that 53-year-old Gregory L. Wilson not be executed because of questions about Wilson’s mental status.

Mr Beshear responded by saying he believes capital punishment is appropriate for some crimes and that he found no circumstances for setting aside the sentence after conducting an “exhaustive review”.

Mr Beshear said he pledged to review clemency petitions for Wilson after final court appeals are complete.

Meanwhile, another killer was executed by lethal injection after spending 16 years on death row.

It was the first execution by Washington state in nine years.

Cal Coburn Brown, 52, raped, tortured and murdered a woman. He died after a four-member team injected a lethal one-drug cocktail in the execution chamber of the Washington State Penitentiary as the father, brother and two sisters of his victim watched.

Brown carjacked Holly Washa, 21, in 1991 in Seattle, robbing, raping and torturing her over a 36-hour period, and then strangling and stabbing her.

He protested at his sentence, saying that criminals who had killed many more people were serving life sentences while he received a death sentence.

“I only killed one victim,” he said. “I cannot really see that there is true justice. Hopefully, sometime in the future that gets straightened out.”