THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Monday, September 16, 1996            TAG: 9609160057
SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B5   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 
DATELINE: RICHMOND                          LENGTH:   53 lines

PARAGUAY SUES VIRGINIA OFFICIALS OVER DEATH PENALTY A PARAGUAYAN WAS CONVICTED OF A 1992 MURDER; THE SUIT SAYS TREATIES WERE BROKEN.

Gov. George Allen and other Virginia officials are being sued by the South American Republic of Paraguay over a death penalty handed out to a Paraguayan national.

The suit, filed Thursday in U.S. District Court, alleges that the officials violated international treaties in how they treated Angel Francisco Breard.

Breard, 30, is on Virginia's Death Row for the 1992 murder of Ruth Dickie in Arlington.

Paraguay is asking the court to find the Virginians in violation of the Vienna Convention of 1963 and the Friendship Treaty of 1859. It wants them to set aside Breard's conviction.

Defendants named include Allen, Attorney General James S. Gilmore III, corrections officials and wardens, the judges of the Arlington County Circuit Court and the Arlington County commonwealth's attorney and chief of police.

Paraguay says nobody told Breard of his right to seek assistance from the Paraguayan consulate. Nobody notified the consulate that a Paraguayan citizen had been arrested. And nobody gave Paraguayan consular officials the opportunity to assist Breard during the trial.

Breard is not a U.S. citizen.

Breard claimed a curse placed on him by his former father-in-law induced him to stab and attempt to rape Dickie on Feb. 17, 1992. He was convicted and sentenced to death in June 1993.

The suit claims that help from Paraguay would have included advice on cultural and legal differences between Paraguay and the United States, ``including the desirability of accepting or rejecting plea offers in light of those differences.''

One of Breard's lawyers, Alexander H. Slaughter, said Paraguay has no death penalty and has shown an interest in opposing capital punishment.

According to the suit, Virginia officials receive periodic notices from the U.S. Department of State that citizens of any nation that has signed the Vienna Convention ``must be informed without delay'' of their rights under the convention when they are arrested or detained in this country.

``Nevertheless . . . in the very least, since 1991, the defendants . . . have adhered to a pattern and practice of disregarding their obligations to notify consular officers under the Vienna Convention and bilateral treaties,'' the complaint says.

Mark Miner, spokesman for the Virginia attorney general's office, would not comment until the suit is answered in court.

KEYWORDS: LAWSUIT DEATH PENALTY PARAGUAY VIRGINIA by CNB