"UN GRANDE GIORNO PER MORIRE"
Giustiziato per un omicidio commesso 20 anni fa

HUNTSVILLE (Texas), 27 giu - "Questo � un grande giorno per morire. Me ne vado con amore e con rispetto. Bisogna smetterla di uccidere e cominciare ad amare. Basta con la violenza, che la mia morte serva almeno a cambiare la societ�. La pena di morte non � necessaria". Queste le ultime parole di Miguel Richardson, giustiziano la notte scorsa nel penitenziario di Huntsville mediante iniezione letale per un omicidio commesso pi� di 20 anni fa. Ex sfruttatore di prostitute, Richardson assassin� una guardia giurata: la vittima, John Ebbert, lo aveva sorpreso mentre forzava la serratura di una camera dell'albergo in cui lavorava. Reag� immediatamente e uccise l'uomo a colpi di pistola, sottrasse al cadavere il denaro che aveva nelle tasche e ordin� a 3 prostitute che erano con lui di eliminare le tracce di sangue dal pavimento. Al processo le donne testimoniarono contro l'omicida. Questa � la nona esecuzione dell'anno in Texas, la numero 248 da quando la pena capitale fu reintrodotta nell'82, altre 6 esecuzioni sono in programma per il resto del 2001. (News2000)

   June 26 7:45 PM ET

Former Pimp Executed in Texas

By MICHAEL GRACZYK, Associated Press Writer
HUNTSVILLE, Texas  - A man was executed by injection Tuesday for fatally shooting one of two hotel security guards slain at a San Antonio hotel in 1979.
Miguel ``Silky'' Richardson, 46, was the ninth condemned inmate to be put to death this year in Texas, where a record 40 convicted killers were executed last year.
``I feel so much love,'' Richardson said as witnesses filed into the chamber.
In Indiana, a man convicted of killing a couple during a home robbery was scheduled to be executed early Wednesday.
Richardson was in a room at a San Antonio hotel with three prostitutes when he was confronted by the security guards responding to a complaint.
As Richardson was being escorted to the lobby, the two unarmed guards, John Ebbert and Howard Powers, were robbed and shot to death. Richardson was arrested a few days later in Denver during another robbery.
The prostitutes testified against him at trial, one of them describing how he made the guards beg for their lives.
In Michigan City, Ind., Jim Lowery was scheduled to die by injection for fatally shooting Mark and Gertrude Thompson, both 82, in their Tippecanoe County home in 1979. He had once worked for the couple as a caretaker.
Lowery, 54, forced his way into the house and shot the couple as well as a caregiver who survived to testify against him. An accomplice was sentenced to prison for 40 years and released in 1999.
Lowery's death original death sentence was overturned, but he received the death penalty again in 1983.
Capital punishment opponents criticized the decision to execute Lowery while a state commission still is studying Indiana's use of the death penalty. Lowery would be the ninth person put to death by the state of Indiana since 1981 and the 81st overall.
Earlier this month, the federal government executed Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh (news - web sites) and Juan Raul Garza, a drug kingpin convicted of involvement in three murders, at the U.S. Penitentiary in Terre Haute.