NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — In the past 45 years, Tennessee has executed one death row inmate. On Tuesday, the state was preparing to administer lethal injection to two condemned murderers on the same day. Sedley Alley, convicted of the 1985 rape and murder of a jogger, and Paul Dennis Reid, a serial killer sentenced to death seven times for a 1997 killing spree, were both scheduled for execution early Wednesday. Attorneys for both were still fighting their executions Tuesday.
Reid, 48, a former Texas drifter with music ambitions, was convicted of murdering seven people at three Tennessee restaurants after he was fired from his job as a dishwasher at a Shoney's. Doctors have testified he is brain damaged and mentally ill, and a hearing was planned Tuesday to determine if he was mentally competent to decide to drop his appeals against his attorneys' advice. The state Supreme Court this month rejected efforts by his attorneys and sister to continue fighting his execution without his cooperation.
Alley, 50, confessed to accosting 19-year-old Marine Suzanne Collins while she jogged near a Navy base north of Memphis. She was raped and killed with a sharpened tree limb. He claimed at trial to have multiple personalities, but since 2004, he has recanted his confession, argued he is innocent and said DNA testing could prove it.
Alley had been scheduled for execution on May 17 but got a reprieve from Gov. Phil Bredesen to seek court permission for the DNA testing. As of Tuesday morning, his defense team, led by Barry Scheck of the Innocence Project, had been unable to persuade a court to order the evidence released. The last Tennessee inmate executed was a convicted child rapist and murderer put to death in 2000. Before that, the last execution was by electric chair in 1960. Tennessee has 108 inmates on death row...
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/nation/4006254.html
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