Feb. 6 DELAWARE: Former prosecutor escapes execution----Lawyer was convicted of murdering mistress in 1996 Prosecutors announced Monday they will not seek a new death penalty hearing for convicted killer Thomas Capano, a once wealthy and well-connected attorney. Capano's death sentence was overturned last month by the Delaware Supreme Court. Prosecutors said the decision means Capano will spend the rest of his life in prison for the 1996 murder of Anne Marie Fahey. Fahey, 30, was a scheduling secretary for then-Gov. Thomas Carper when Capano killed her and dumped her body in the Atlantic Ocean because she was breaking off an affair with him, prosecutors said. Capano himself was a former state prosecutor. The state Supreme Court upheld Capano's murder conviction but overturned his death sentence on Jan. 11 because jurors didn't unanimously agree that the crime was the result of substantial planning. Attorney General Carl Danberg said Monday he decided against a new sentencing hearing for Capano after lengthy deliberations with state and federal prosecutors, and with Fahey's family. "We concluded it was time to finish this case," he said. Superior Court Judge T. Henley Graves, who still must formally sentence Capano to life in prison without parole, scheduled a hearing for Friday. (source: Associated Press) NEW MEXICO: Accused cop killer avoids death penalty A man who was to face trial for allegedly driving over and killing a State Police officer has reached a plea agreement with prosecutors that will allow him to avoid the death penalty. Zacharia Craig is pleading guilty but mentally ill to the murder of Offiicer Lloyd Aragon. Aragon was struck in the median of Interstate 40 in August of 2001 by a car in which Zacharia Craig was fleeing from a shoplifting incident. Aragon had just placed a spike belt on the freeway east of Albuquerque when he was struck. Sandoval County Judge Louis McDonald ruled in October that Craig could face the death penalty if found guilty of the murder. Defender Jeff Buckels had argued in the past that Craig should not face the death penalty because his psychological and medical problems make Craig, for the purpose of applying the death penalty, mentally retarded. Craig has documented thyroid disease and a brain disorder. In May of 2003, Judge McDonald found Craig to be both incompetent to stand trail and dangerous and ordered him to be committed to the New Mexico State Hospital at Las Vegas psychiatric unit unless or until his mental competency improved. In June of 2004, after Craig had undergone a year of treatment in Las Vegas, McDonald ruled that Craig had become competent to stand trial for the murder of Aragon. Craig will be held at the Las Vegas hospitals psychiatric unit until sentencing. He could face up to 30 years in prison. (source: KOB TV News) IOWA: Death penalty advocates pledge to keep pushing against opposition A leading death penalty advocate in the Legislature says there's no conflict in his beliefs. Senator Larry McKibben of Marshalltown is an anti-abortion Republican. He has drafted a bill that would allow the death penalty in cases were a child is kidnapped, raped and murdered. To avoid one issue that might give abortion foes trouble, the bill specifies that a pregnant woman sentenced to death must first give birth before the sentence is carried out. McKibben says the bill was prompted by the death of 10-year-old Jetseta Gage of Cedar Rapids in March 2005. Last week, a jury convicted Roger Bentley of 1st-degree murder and first-degree kidnapping. Both crimes carry a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole. A similar case in 1994 -- the abduction and slaying of nine-year-old Anna Marie Emry of Grinnell -- prompted the last serious death penalty debate. Iowa repealed its death sentence in 1965. (source: Associated Press)
