Ohio Judge Rejects Death Sentence

AKRON BEACON JOURNAL, May 25—A Wayne County judge has rejected a jury's recommendation for the death penalty in the 1998 murder of a retired Air Force officer.

“Instead of sending Gregory D. Crawford, 37, to death row, Common Pleas Judge Mark K. Wiest handed down the only alternate sentence allowed by Ohio law: life in prison with no possibility of parole,” reported the Akron Beacon Journal.

It was only the fifth time since 1981 that a jury's verdict of death was overturned.

The judge said he was “not firmly convinced death is the appropriate punishment,” reported the paper.

Crawford was convicted of bludgeoning Gene O. Palmer, 55, during a robbery at abarn near his home.

Palmer never regained consciousness and died 72 days later.

The jury deliberated two days before convicting Crawford of aggravated murder, aggravated robbery, burglary and grand theft of a motor vehicle, said the paper. Six days later,during the penalty phase of the trial, the jury returned a recommendation for the death penalty.

“Wiest disagreed, citing several factors in Crawford's background that argued for mercy, including his ‘relative youth,’ normal intelligence and good behavior while awaiting trial in the county jail, where he underwent a religious conversion,” the paper stated.

An attorney with the Ohio Public Defender's office specializing in capitalcases, Richard Vickers, said “that a life sentence, with the possibility of doing something productive while in prison, is appropriate for someone ‘who doesn't pose a dangerto other inmates or corrections officers,’” the paper reported.

Forbes to Ask Princeton To Shun ‘Professor Death’

THE WASHINGTON TIMES, May 24—Republican presidential candidate Steve Forbes, a member of the board of trustees at Princeton University, said he will ask the school's president to rescind the appointment of bioethicist Peter Singer, The Washington Times reported.

Singer, 52, who teaches at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, advocatesthe killing of certain disabled babies within the first month of their lives and is scheduled to arrive at the university July 1, said the report.

His theories on the value of human life have not only drawn fire abroad, “but also in this country where he has earned the label of ‘Professor Death,’” said the paper.

“Others have called him ‘a bigot against people with disabilities.’”

Singer welcomes the opportunity to work in the United States, said the report.

Harold Shapiro, Princeton's president and head of President Clinton's National Bioethics Advisory Commission, defended the hiring and said Singer was “internationally ‘revered,’ and would spark a vigorous debate among students,” said the paper. “He characterized Mr. Singer's views on the efficacy of killing the disabled as ‘provocative.’”

Mary Jane Owen, director of the National Catholic Office for Persons with Disabilities, described Singer's hiring as “a disservice not only to Princeton but the nation,” said the paper.

Singer “lacks knowledge and sensitivity about the commonality of human vulnerability and fragility.”

In the report, Owen added, “The American spirit is that we've alwaysadmired persons who overcome challenges.”