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

DATE: SATURDAY, April 8, 1995                   TAG: 9504110054
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-4   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND                                LENGTH: Medium

DEATH ROW SUICIDES DEBATED

Virginia spends hundreds of thousands of dollars to get death-row inmates ready for their executions, but the state has an obligation to keep them alive until the appointed time, officials said.

The state Department of Corrections, which is investigating a reported suicide pact between two death-row inmates, maintains that suicides run counter to a prison's mission of providing a safe environment for inmates, department spokeswoman Amy Miller said. That environment includes making convicts safe from hurting themselves, she said.

``Besides, we wouldn't stand by and watch someone die,'' she said.

Guards at Mecklenburg Correctional Center, where Virginia's death row is housed, are trained to watch for signs that prisoners might be considering suicide.

In the most recent suicide attempts on death row, Michael W. Williams, 27, and William I. Saunders, 25, were discovered in their cells Wednesday with their arms cut and bleeding, the Corrections Department said. The two lived two cells apart and fashioned the weapons they used from razors and toothbrushes they had in their cells.

After treatment at a hospital, Williams and Saunders were taken Friday to Powhatan Correctional Center's infirmary, where they were in stable condition, Miller said. That prison has better medical facilities to treat the inmates, she said.

Ethics experts agree the state must keep the condemned alive until their official execution. ``It's a great irony, because they are getting ready to die by the same hand that is protecting them,'' said John C. Fletcher, the professor of medical ethics at the University of Virginia Medical School.

Although an argument can be made that rational people may end their lives if they are terminally ill, Fletcher said that because prisoners have lost their freedom, they must be watched and stopped from killing themselves.

The American Civil Liberties Union says sane people should be able to make the choice whether they live or die, said Kent Willis, the director of the Virginia chapter of the organization. But in prison, the state has to enforce the law and protect death row inmates from themselves.

``I think the most important thing for the state is to impartially apply the law,'' he said. ``If it's illegal to commit suicide, then the state has the right to enforce that law on prisoners.'' Even if suicide is legal, the corrections officials have the right to prevent it for the good of the prisoner, he said.

by CNB