THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 15, 1994 TAG: 9406150472
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B3 EDITION: NORTH CAROLINA
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: 940615 LENGTH: WASHINGTON
The denial cleared the way for Lawson's execution by lethal gas early today.
{REST} The court's decision noted that Justice Harry Blackmun dissented, but did not specify how other justices voted.
Blackmun said he found Lawson's challenge to the gas chamber to be a serious one.
``Only four states, Arizona, California, Mississippi and North Carolina, still use the gas chamber as a method of execution,'' Blackmun noted. ``Its cruelty has been attested to on more than one occasion.''
Blackmun, reiterating his conclusion ``that the death penalty cannot be imposed fairly within the constraints of our Constitution,'' said he would have granted Lawson a stay of execution and a review and vacated the death sentence.
Lawson, 38, was to die by gas for the 1980 slaying of Wayne Shinn, who caught Lawson breaking into his Concord home.
The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Lawson's last-minute appeal earlier Tuesday.
Attorneys for the convicted killer had argued that execution by gas should be declared unconstitutional as a cruel and unusual punishment.
The Supreme Court on Tuesday also denied talk show host Phil Donahue's request to videotape Lawson's execution. Lawson had said that having his execution filmed would give his life meaning. Donahue, a death penalty opponent, believes the public has a right to see executions.
The court's one-line order did not include comment from the justices or how they voted.
Gov. James B. Hunt said Tuesday he had no plans to commute Lawson's sentence to life imprisonment.
{KEYWORDS} CAPITAL PUNISHMENT EXECUTION U.S. SUPREME COURT DECISION by CNB