Murderer executed in North Carolina
Attempts to reduce sentence to life in prison fail
RALEIGH, North Carolina (AP) -- The killer of two women and a pair of young children was executed by injection early Friday in North Carolina after failed attempts by lawyers to reduce his sentence to life in prison.
Earl Richmond Jr., 43, was pronounced dead at 2:19 a.m. at the state's Central Prison in Raleigh, said Pamela Walker, spokeswoman for the state Corrections Department.
Richmond spent Thursday meeting with family members and his lawyers, Walker said.
One of Richmond's attorneys, Jonathan Broun, said Richmond transformed himself in prison. Richmond had discovered religion and felt sorrow for his victims.
"The old Earl Richmond that did these crimes died many years ago," Broun said after the execution.
Richmond didn't profess his remorse for the crimes during recent appeals because he didn't want it to be seen as a false gesture, Broun said.
"I am a new man, not in the eyes of man, but in the eyes of our creator," Richmond said in a handwritten statement distributed after his death. "I am free."
Richmond's legal team had urged the U.S. Supreme Court to stop the execution because they believed that improper testimony was allowed during his trial.
The court declined to hear the appeal Thursday evening, and Gov. Mike Easley later denied clemency for Richmond, allowing the execution to move forward.
Richmond was sentenced to death by a Cumberland County jury in 1995 for the killings of 27-year-old Helisa Stewart Hayes, her 8-year-old son, Phillip, and her 7-year-old daughter, Darien.
After his arrest in North Carolina, Richmond was charged in the April 5, 1991, slaying of Army Spec. Lisa Ann Nadeau at Fort Dix, New Jersey. Nadeau, 24, of Plainfield, Connecticut, was found bound, beaten, stabbed and strangled in her Army base residence.
Richmond is the second person executed in North Carolina this year and the 36th since capital punishment was reinstated in 1977.
A group called People of Faith Against the Death Penalty held a vigil outside the entrance to Central Prison on Thursday.
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