Bush spurns Indiana archbishop`s plea to spare life of federal death row inmate Louis Jones.

President George W. Bush declined pleas by Indianapolis Archbishop Daniel M. Buechlein and others asking him to grant clemency to Louis Jones, a decorated Gulf War veteran who was executed March 18 at the U.S. Penitentiary in nearby Terre Haute, Ind. Jones was the third federal death row inmate executed since the U.S. government ended a 38-year moratorium on the death penalty in June 2001.

The 52-year-old Jones was a master sergeant in the Airborne Rangers before retiring from the Army in 1993 after a 22-year military career in which he earned numerous medals, badges and awards. He was convicted of a 1995 murder committed while working as a bus driver at an Air Force base in Texas. He admitted the killing and was sentenced to death later that year.

During his trial, defense experts testified that Jones suffered from brain damage caused by childhood abuse and post-traumatic stress related to combat service in the Persian Gulf and in Grenada. He claims that exposure to nerve gas during the 1991 Gulf War led to his psychological problems that precipitated the crime. in addition, two jurors from Jones�s initial trial say there was confusion among jury members over instructions that may have led to his receiving the death penalty rather than life without parole.

In a Feb. 13 letter to President Bush, Archbishop Buechlein explained that Catholics believe relying on the death penalty as a form of punishment shows disrespect for human life. �Mr. President, I believe that you are a good man concerned about the dignity of human life,� he wrote. �Please have the courage to step forward and put an end to the death penalty in our beloved country. Begin by sparing the life of Louis Jones.�

Writing as general chairman of the Indiana Catholic Conference and as the Catholic archbishop �in whose archdiocese the U.S. Penitentiary at Terre Haute is located,� the archbishop told the president: �Be assured of my prayers for you as you struggle with this decision. We recognize the importance of justly punishing Mr. Jones� crime, but we believe the appropriate punishment for Mr. Jones would be life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.�