Ohio executes man for killing his girlfriend, daughter
LUCASVILLE, Ohio (AP) -- A man was executed Wednesday after asking to be killed for shooting his girlfriend and their daughter, then refrigerating their bodies for a month in their apartment.
Stephen Vrabel, 47, was the second Ohio death row inmate since 1999 to drop his appeals to speed his execution. He was pronounced dead at 10:14 a.m. at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility.
"I'd rather be dead than be alive in prison," Vrabel, who had initially been found incompetent to stand trial, said in an interview Friday.
Gov. Bob Taft on Monday declined to stop Vrabel's scheduled execution. The Ohio Parole Board had voted earlier against recommending clemency.
Vrabel shot Susan Clemente, 29, his girlfriend of about four years, and their daughter, 3-year-old Lisa Clemente, in March 1989 at their apartment in the Youngstown suburb of Struthers.
Vrabel never said why he shot Susan Clemente. He said he shot their daughter -- whom he described as a "perfect child" -- in part because she was "freaking out" about her mother's death.
After the shootings, Vrabel placed Clemente's body in the refrigerator and Lisa's in the freezer along with her favorite stuffed animals.
A relative of Clemente's found the bodies after about a month when he went to the apartment to collect overdue rent. Vrabel confessed to a priest and then to police.
After being deemed incompetent to stand trial, Vrabel spent five years at a psychiatric center. Vrabel was then ruled competent to stand trial in 1995 and was convicted of two counts of aggravated murder. Vrabel's attorneys had tried unsuccessfully to show that he was insane, and his appeal had centered in part on whether he was competent to stand trial.
The Ohio Supreme Court upheld Vrabel's death sentence by a 4-3 vote last year.
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