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

DATE: TUESDAY, October 24, 1995                   TAG: 9510240052
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH                                LENGTH: Medium

MAN TO GET DEATH PENALTY FOR KILLINGS

A man who admitted killing four people in a neighborhood bar was sentenced to death Monday after an impassioned plea by his attorney to spare his life.

``Death is not the answer to death,'' attorney Pete Legler said in urging a life sentence for Michael D. Clagett, 33. ``We prize life. ... the emptiness will still be there no matter what happens to Mr. Clagett.''

Commonwealth's Attorney Robert Humphreys told Circuit Judge Edward Hanson Jr. that Clagett's crime justified the maximum penalty recommended by the jury. The panel convicted Clagett in July.

``He may have been encouraged, he may have planned it with someone else, but it was his finger on the trigger,'' Humphreys said.

Hanson gave Clagett the five death sentences recommended by the jury plus three years on robbery and firearms charges.

Clagett's girlfriend, Denise Holsinger, 30, was sentenced last week to five life terms in prison plus 23 years. She was convicted on first-degree murder charges.

The owner of the Witchduck Inn, two employees and a patron were found murdered in the bar late on the night of June 30, 1994.

Clagett was a regular customer at the bar, and Holsinger had been fired as a waitress less than a month before the slayings.

In a tearful confession to police, Clagett admitted to the murders but said Holsinger wanted to rob the bar and urged him to kill those inside.

Legler said Holsinger manipulated Clagett.

``The crime originated in her mind,'' he said. ``She set the machinery in motion.''

Legler told Hanson that Clagett constantly is punishing himself because he considered the victims his friends. He said a death sentence ``may be the only way out for Mr. Clagett, to terminate the grief, to terminate the self-hatred.''

Clagett did not make a statement, and Hanson made no comment in handing down the sentences.

Hanson set Jan. 23 as Clagett's execution date. But that date almost certainly will be set aside because capital murder cases involving death sentences automatically are appealed to the state supreme court.

by CNB