PENA MORTE: USA, ESEGUITA CONDANNA IN MISSOURI

SAINT-LOUIS (USA), 9 GEN - Un uomo, James Johnson,  riconosciuto colpevole dell'uccisione nel 1991 di tre poliziotti e della  moglie di uno sceriffo, e' stato messo a morte oggi nello stato del  Missouri, negli Usa.

 Johnson, 52 anni, e' stato ucciso con una iniezione letale nel  penitenziario di Potosi. Prima dell'esecuzione, Johnson ha detto di essere  pentito delle sue azioni e di sperare nel perdono divino.

 I suoi avvocati avevano sostenuto che non era sano di mente e avevano  presentato appello contro la condanna, ma non avevano ottenuto la revisione  del processo. 

Missouri executes killer of four

 POTOSI, Mo., Jan 9 - A Vietnam War veteran who blamed his 1991  shooting rampage on wartime flashbacks was executed on Wednesday in a case  that became an issue in the confirmation hearing of U.S. Attorney General  John Ashcroft.

 James Johnson, 52, was executed by lethal injection at 12:06 a.m. CST at  Potosi Correctional Center, a prison spokesman said.  His last words consisted of an apology to survivors of his victims.

 "I know that I caused irreparable damage to each surviving family  member," Johnson said. "I earnestly pray for your forgiveness." His last  meal consisted of steak, french fries and a salad.

 Johnson, a helicopter mechanic with the Missouri National Guard, fatally  shot sheriff's deputy Leslie Roark when she arrived at Johnson's home to  investigate a disturbance involving his teenage step-daughter.

 Johnson -- who his lawyers argued was fantasizing that he was back in a  Vietnam War-era "free-fire zone" -- drove to the home of Moniteau County  Sheriff Kenny Jones, firing rifle shots that killed Jones' wife Pamela, a  mother of four. Johnson then staked out the county sheriff's office, gunning  down two more deputies. 

 A jury convicted Johnson of the four killings and he was sentenced to  death. In a 1998 review, Missouri's Supreme Court upheld the decision but  Judge Ronnie White dissented, arguing for a new trial because Johnson's  lawyers had ruined his insanity plea.

 White said Johnson's attorneys first misidentified the traumatizing  wartime firefight Johnson's platoon was involved in and then mistakenly  claimed Johnson had set up a "trip-wire" at his home to identify intruders.

 The trip-wire was set up by a deputy after the initial shooting.

 In 1999, then-U.S. Sen. John Ashcroft, a staunch Republican  conservative, persuaded the senate to reject White's nomination to a federal  judgeship in St. Louis, citing the Johnson ruling as an example of White's  "pro-criminal" stance that branded him "unmistakably liberal and activist."

 Subsequently when Ashcroft underwent senate confirmation hearings to  become attorney general, there were intimations among some legislators that  his campaign against White, Missouri's first black Supreme Court judge,  smacked of racism.

 White testified at the hearings that Ashcroft had made "baseless  misrepresentations" of his record.

 Ashcroft has since tried to mend fences with black lawmakers upet about  White's treatment, and said he would not oppose White being nominated again  for a federal judgeship.

 The U.S. Supreme Court twice refused to take up Johnson's case, the last  time in March.

 Johnson was the eighth person put to death in Missouri this  year and the 54th since the state resumed carrying out the  death penalty in 1989