WASHINGTON, 4 DIC - Un omosessuale che uccise per soldi i genitori del suo compagno e' stato messo a morte, mercoledi' sera, nel carcere di Huntsville, in Texas.

E' stata la prima di una serie di otto esecuzioni previste negli Stati Uniti prima di Natale (quattro solo in Texas, nel giro di otto giorni).

L'assassino, Richard Charles Duncan, che aveva 61 anni, voleva condividere col suo compagno la polizza di 500 mila dollari dell'assicurazione sulla vita di John e Ruth High.

Nel 1987, Duncan uccise gli High a casa loro, a Houston.

I soldi gli dovevano servire per rimettere in sesto i suoi affari, che stavano andando male e che lui mandava avanti con il figlio delle vittime e un terzo uomo.

Prima di ricevere l'iniezione letale, Duncan s'e' proclamato innocente e ha salutato la sua famiglia. La sua e' stata la 23/a condanna a morte eseguita quest'anno in Texas, lo Stato dell'Unione dove la pena e' piu' praticata.

WASHINGTON, 5 DIC - Un uomo che, 14 anni or sono, uccise una donna di 80 anni che gli aveva appena offerto una coppa di gelato e' stato messo a morte nel carcere di Huntsville, nel Texas, con un'iniezione letale.

Ivan Murphy, 38 anni, e il suo complice Douh Stoff s'erano recati a casa di Lula Mae Denning, a Denison, nel Texas, per derubarla. La donna, che conosceva Murphy da quand'era bambino, lo invito' a prendere il gelato. Poi venne aggredita e uccisa

a botte in testa. 

L'esecuzione di giovedi' e' stata la seconda consecutiva in Texas e la seconda delle cinque previste nello Stato a dicembre. Murphy e' stato la 313/a persona messa a morte in Texas da quando le esecuzioni sono riprese nel 1982 e la 24/a dall'inizio dell'anno. 

Prima di ricevere l'iniezione letale, Murphy, che durante il processo aveva cercato di scaricare sul suo complice, poi condannato al carcere la vita, la responsabilita' del delitto, ha avuto parole di fede e di ringraziamento ''al Padreterno e al Papa Giovanni Paolo II per le loro benedizioni''.

TEXAS - Killer with weakness for ice cream executed

A former mechanic with an extensive criminal record in Oklahoma was executed tonight for fatally beating an 80-year-old woman he'd known since childhood.

Ivan Murphy, 38, was the 2nd convicted killer executed in as many nights in Texas.

"This is a celebration of life, not death," Murphy said in a brief final statement while strapped to the death chamber gurney. "Through Jesus Christ we have victory over death."

He thanked Pope John Paul II and others for prayers, love and support. "I want to thank everybody around the world and Father, let your will be done."

As the drugs began taking effect, he gasped several times. Ten minutes later, at 6:24 p.m., he was pronounced dead.

Strawberry ice cream in a plastic bowl helped convict Murphy of the 1989 slaying of Lula Mae Denning at her home in Denison, about 70 miles north of Dallas and just south of the Texas-Oklahoma border.

"We dusted the inside of a Cool Whip bowl and found his fingerprint," said former Grayson County District Attorney Robert Jarvis, recalling evidence in Murphy's capital murder trial. "He told officers he hadn't been there in 20 years. He was lying about that."

Besides the fingerprint, jewelry taken from the victim was linked to Murphy and traces of the woman's blood were found on his clothes.

"I wasn't there," he insisted in a recent death-row interview. "No way I can be associated with this crime. I know I got framed."

All his appeals were exhausted, Murphy said Wednesday.

Murphy had a record for theft in Grayson County and was paroled in 1985 to McAlester, Okla., after serving 6 1/2 months of a three-year prison term. In Oklahoma, he had multiple convictions and prison terms for concealing stolen property, larceny of an automobile and grand larceny.

A week after the Denning slaying, he was arrested in Hugo, Okla., on two counts of shooting with intent to kill. Murphy said he was responding to someone who shot at him.

"I was wrong for having a gun," he said. "But that's what happens when you're weak. To me, I was at the wrong place at the wrong time. It's a case of bad luck. I know I didn't kill nobody. I'm not a killer."

A Murphy accomplice, Douglas Stoff, also was convicted in the slaying. He received a life term.

Police were summoned to Denning's home after she couldn't be reached by phone.

"I remember a little old lady sitting in her chair with her blood splattered all over the wall and the ceiling and dripping down on the newspaper," Jarvis said. "She died in her own chair in her own living room. It was horrible.

"They took either her cane and or a sawed-off shotgun they brought with them and just beat her as she sat in her chair."

The investigation showed Stoff and Murphy were at Stoff's house sniffing paint and doing drugs and went to Murphy's old neighborhood, where he was known as "Pee Wee," to rob her. According to Murphy's statement to police, they went to steal her purse and because she knew him, she invited them in and offered him the ice cream.

At some point, she was attacked and robbed of jewelry, including a $7,000 wedding ring that another man said he bought the next morning from Murphy. Evidence also showed the attackers may have returned to the woman's house.

"Police took advantage of me because I was in a drunken stupor," Murphy said of his comments to officers who questioned him about the slaying.

"Why would we pick Ivan Ray Murphy to pin a murder on?" Jarvis asked, dismissing the inmate's claims. "I feel very confident we have the correct individual that did the crime. I don't have any problems with this verdict at all."

Wednesday night, 61-year-old Richard Duncan was put to death for killing an elderly Houston couple 16 years ago in a scheme to share their life insurance proceeds. 3 more Texas inmates are set to die on consecutive nights next week.

Murphy becomes the 24th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in Texas, and the 313th overall since the state resumed capital punishment on December 7, 1982. Both totals are the highest in the nation.

Murphy becomes the 74th condemned inmate to be executed in Texas since Rick Perry became governor in 2001. 152 condemned inmates were put to death in Texas during the tenure of George W. Bush as governor.

Murphy becomes the 64th condemned inmate to be put to death this year in the USA and the 884th overall since America resumed executions on January 17, 1977.