Bush eives convicted child killer reorieve
■ Ricky McGinn will have 30
more days to live while
potentially exonerating DNA
evidence is reviewed
By Michael Graczyk
The Associated Press
HUNTSVILLE, Texas — Gov.
George W. Bush, campaigning for
president as a compassionate con
servative, blocked Thursday
evening’s scheduled execution of
a convicted killer by approving
his first reprieve in a Texas death
penalty case.
Bush said he approved a 30-day
reprieve for Ricky McGinn so that
potential DNA evidence that
might exonerate him could be re
viewed, although the U.S.
Supreme Court had earlier denied
McGinn’s appeals.
“Any time DNA evidence used
in this context can be relevant as
to the guilt or innocence of a per
son on death row, we need to use
it,” Bush told reporters in Sacra
mento during a hastily arranged
news conference.
“I expect the courts and all rele
vant parties to act expeditiously to
review the evidence and finally
determine his guilt as to the
charge of rape in this case,” added
the governor, who took no ques
tions.
The reprieve came less than a
half-hour before the convicted
murderer was set to die for killing
his 12-year-old stepdaughter sev
en years ago.
Bush, a conservative Republi
can who has been trying to appeal
to moderate voters, has allowed
131 lethal injections over his 5 1/2
years as governor of the nation’s
busiest execution state.
McGinn and his attorneys want
additional DNA testing, which
they say will exonerate him. Al
though DNA evidence was used
by prosecutors to help convict
McGinn of the May 1993 rape and
ax slaying of Stephanie Flanary,
his lawyers contend more sophis
ticated testing now exists to aid
his case.
“Thank you for the chance. It
came so close,” McGinn told
prison officials after receiving the
word at 5:42 p.m. CDT, 18 minutes
before he could have been taken to
the death chamber. “I’m glad.
Maybe they’ll see what I’ve been
telling them all these years.”
The prison warden allowed
him to call his family.
“I’m just fine,” he told them,
asking if they heard the news and
telling them he loved them.
“He was mostly reserved,”
prison spokesman Larry Fitzger
ald said, describing McGinn’s de
meanor upon hearing word of the
reprieve. “He didn’t show a lot of
emotion.”
Because Bush was campaigning
out of state, the reprieve actually
was issued by state Sen. Rodney
Ellis, a Democrat from Houston,
who has approved three previous
executions. As president pro-tem
of the Texas Senate, Ellis constitu
tionally was in charge because Lt.
Gov. Rick Perry, a Republican, also
was out of the state.
“Throughout this process, I
have been in close contact with
the governor’s office and we agree
that a reprieve is necessary in this
case,” Ellis said. “I sincerely be
lieve in the principle of swift and
sure punishment, but our para
mount concern must always be
that justice is done. In my view, it
is in the best interests of justice to
delay Mr. McGinn’s execution and
permit new DNA testing.”
McGinn’s attorney, Richard Al
ley, said he felt “intense relief”
when the reprieve came down.
“We had planned for this con
tingency, and we expect to have a
working agreement within 48
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hours as to how we’re going to get
the evidence and how we’re going
to get the testing done,” Alley
said.
The prosecutor who put
McGinn on death row said he re
spected Bush’s decision.
“I have mixed emotions about it
from the standpoint of the family
who was sitting there in
Huntsville waiting for this to hap
pen,” Brown County District At
torney Lee Haney said.
The McGinn case illustrates a
heightened national debate over
the death penalty, which Bush fa
vors. Illinois Gov. George Ryan, a
Republican like Bush, imposed a
moratorium on executions in Jan
uary amid concern innocent peo
ple were on death row.
During his tenure as governor,
Bush refused in 1998 to block the
lethal injection of Karla Tucker,
the first execution of a Texas
woman since the Civil War era. A
second woman, Betty Lou Beets,
was executed in February, with
Bush abandoning the GOP presi
dential primary campaign to re
turn to Texas to sign off on her
punishment.
In 1992, then Arkansas Gov. Bill
Clinton at least twice pulled off
the Democratic presidential cam
paign to review the cases of con
demned inmates. In each case, the
convicts were executed, allowing
Clinton to put forth a tough-on
crime image in hopes of attracting
more conservative voters.
For Bush, a reprieve could be
perceived as the opposite, allow
ing him to soften an image and at
tract more moderate voters.
Bush’s likely Democratic oppo
nent, Vice President A1 Gore, said
Thursday that Bush had a difficult
decision but that it should not be
viewed in terms of politics.
“I don’t know the facts of the
Texas case, but I think that DNA
and DNA testing is a valuable new
tool that can provide new evi
dence in a lot of cases,” Gore said.
Despite the anticipated re
prieve, Texas prison officials had
prepared for the execution of
McGinn, who had even eaten
what was to be his final meal: a
double-meat cheeseburger, french
fries and a Dr Pepper, which he ate
in a small cell a few feet from the
death house.
Earlier, he spent more than 31/2
hours meeting with relatives, then
was taken at midday from the Ter
rell Unit near Livingston, a to the
Huntsville Unit, where execu
tions are carried out.
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