Missouri executes twice-convicted killer
BONNE TERRE, Missouri (AP) -- A twice-convicted murderer who strangled a 9-year-old girl in St. Louis in 1986 was executed early Wednesday after a split vote by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Vernon Brown, 51, was pronounced dead at 2:25 a.m. at the Eastern Reception Diagnostic and Correctional Center, nearly 2 1/2 hours after his execution was scheduled.
The execution was delayed when U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas issued a temporary stay shortly after midnight. But on a 5-4 vote, the court later lifted that stay and denied the stay.
Lawyers for Brown had argued that the drugs used in lethal injection could cause him excessive pain. They also said he was sexually and physically abused as a child, suffered a head injury and was on the drug PCP at the time of the murder.
Dianne Perkins, the aunt of murdered fourth grader Janet Perkins, said the killer had the benefit of almost two decades of life denied to her niece. "He lived for years, but she only saw nine," Perkins said.
Perkins and other family members did not attend Brown's execution.
Brown has been convicted of first-degree murder twice, both times receiving the death penalty, though Wednesday's execution was for the killing of the child. In the other case, Brown stabbed 19-year-old Synetta Ford and strangled her with a curling iron cord in 1985.
On October 24, 1986, Janet was walking home from school when Brown enticed the child into his home. He locked his stepsons in their bedroom and took the girl to the basement. There, he bound her feet and a hand with a wire coat hanger and strangled her with a rope. Her body was found wrapped in trash bags in an alley behind Brown's house the next day.
Perkins said Janet was fond of animals and jumping rope with her friends. "She would have been 28. He took her away from her family and friends. She never had a chance to really experience life," she said.
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