
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, August 4, 1994                   TAG: 9408040064
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

LAST-MINUTE APPEALS EXHAUSTED, ARKANSAS EXECUTES 3 PRISONERS

Three men who killed a man in front of his family were executed one by one Wednesday as the Supreme Court rejected arguments they were treated like ``hogs at a slaughter.'' It was the nation's first triple execution in 32 years.

Hoyt Clines, 37, James Holmes, 37, and Darryl Richley, 43, each declined to make final statements as they were led into the execution chamber.

Clines, the first to die, was strapped to a gurney at 7 p.m. and injected with a lethal dose of drugs. Asked if he had any last words, he replied: ``Nope.'' He was pronounced dead at 7:11 p.m.

Fifty-eight minutes later, Richley died on the same gurney. Asked if he had any last words, he said: ``No.''

James Holmes followed Richley into the prison death chamber within an hour and was pronounced dead at 9:24 p.m. He also said ``no'' when asked if he had any last words.

A three-judge panel of the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals had stayed Holmes' execution earlier Wednesday, but three hours later the full 8th Circuit voted 8-3 to lift the stay, and the high court declined to issue one.

Holmes, Clines and Richley were convicted of killing businessman Don Lehman during a 1981 robbery.

Lehman was beaten with a motorcycle chain and shot in the chest and head by four masked men who forced their way into his home, chased him down and held him on a bed.

The death sentence of a fourth man convicted in the murder was reduced after a court ruled that hypnosis-induced testimony from the victim's daughter may have affected his sentencing.

Shortly before the parade of executions began, the U.S. Supreme Court denied appeals by all three men that they were being reduced to ``hogs at a slaughter.''

The prison planned for 45 to 60 minutes between executions - enough time to carry the body out in a bag, wipe down the gurney and change the needle before the next man was brought in.

The state has said multiple executions reduce overtime and stress on employees. ``Nobody wants to get up in the morning and go kill somebody,'' Correction Department spokesman Alan Ables said earlier this year.

The nation's last triple execution was Aug. 8, 1962, when three men went to the gas chamber in California. Arkansas put two prisoners to death for unrelated crimes on May 11 in the first double execution since the Supreme Court in 1976 allowed capital punishment to resume.

On Feb. 1-2, 1951, Virginia sent eight men to the electric chair. Before that, at least 17 states executed four or more people in one day.

by CNB