On this day, January 19, 2005, a Missouri
recidivist killer, Donald Beardslee was executed by means of a
lethal injection in in San Quentin State Prison, California. I find it
hard to believe that abolitionists can protest his execution despite, the fact
that he had murdered once, went on parole to murder twice again.
I
got the information about him from Wikipedia and some other links.
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Beardslee in 2000, 16 years after death
sentence. (California Department of Corrections photo via Associated Press)
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Donald Jay Beardslee (May 13, 1943 – January 19, 2005) was an American
murderer executed by means of a lethal injection in San Quentin State Prison, California.
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Donald Beardslee as an airman in the 1960s.
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Early
life
Born
in St. Louis, Missouri in 1943, Beardslee was the oldest of three children and
his father died when he was 11. He was sent to a military school at age 15 and
joined the U.S. Air Force at 19 where he served for four years as an aircraft
mechanic. He and another airman were caught in 1965 while trying to steal a
vehicle. He was sentenced to a work farm in Minnesota where he was hit by a
falling tree and suffered a head fracture and a days-long coma.
He
was married to Karen Kelly from 1966 to 1968.
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Beardslee in 2000, 16 years after death
sentence. (California Department of Corrections photo via Associated Press)
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Patty Geddling, 23, and Stacey Benjamin,
19, whom Beardslee admitted killing and dumping
in secluded spots after a dispute over a $185 drug deal in Redwood City, Calif. |
Criminal
career
In
1969 in Missouri, he choked, stabbed and drowned Laura Griffin, whom he had
just met. They met in a bar, he went home with her and killed her. Beardslee
turned himself in and confessed to the killing. He was convicted and served
seven years before being released on parole. No motive was established nor did
he offer any explanation.
Four
years after leaving prison, he was arrested in California for the April 25,
1981 drug-related homicide of 19-year-old Patty Geddling and 23-year-old Stacie
Benjamin in Redwood City, California. Prosecutors claim that a drug deal
between the friends of Beardslee's roommate had gone wrong. His roommate,
Rickie Soria, lured the two to their apartment. The prosecutors noted that
Beardslee sent Soria out to get duct tape to bind the victims before they
arrived. Beardslee and, according to the prosecution, Bill Forrester, both shot
Geddling, and later Beardslee slashed Benjamin's throat after Cleo Frank
Rutherford had tried to strangle her.
Beardslee's
phone number was found near Geddling's body and when police called he confessed
and led them to Benjamin's body. At the time of this offence, he was still on
parole for the 1969 Missouri killing which made him eligible for the death
penalty as a repeat offender. Rutherford was sentenced to life in prison and
died there in 2003. Soria pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and was still
in prison in 2005. Bill Forrester was acquitted of charges in the case and
charges against a fourth person were dropped before trial. Beardslee was
convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death.
The
defense tried to appeal on the grounds of inadequate defense since the original
lawyer quit the case, and on grounds of mental defect due to a head injury from
a falling tree in the Minnesota work farm accident when he was 21. Prosecutors
noted that he was of above average intelligence although family members
testified he had lifelong trouble expressing emotion and prison records
indicate diagnoses of schizophrenia.
He
was executed on January 19, 2005. Beardslee was the first prisoner to be
executed in California since Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger took office.
Schwarzenegger denied clemency to Beardslee, stating that "we are not
dealing here with a man who is so generally affected by his impairment that he
cannot tell the difference between right and wrong."
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