Here are two more: James Parker. And, for good measure, two more: Robert Tulloch.

The first, Klebold, was the trailing half of the Columbine killers, the cold-blooded partner of Eric Harris, a reptile in a black western duster. Klebold was 17 when he joined Harris in a killing spree that took the lives of 12 classmates, plus a teacher.

Tulloch and Parker, of Chelsea, Vt., schemed to kill most anyone who might have a boatload of cash available with an ATM card to finance a tour of Australia. In January 2001, they settled on their victims: Susanne and Half Zantop, beloved and well-known Dartmouth College professors.

According to Parker, the pair posed as students conducting a survey. Once inside the professors' house, Tulloch stabbed Half Zantop, and Parker slashed Susanne Zantop's throat when she came to investigate the commotion. Parker was 16 at the time; Tulloch, 17.

None of these cases got to trial. Klebold and Harris turned their weapons on themselves as authorities closed in. Parker turned state's evidence in exchange for a conspiracy plea and a 25-year sentence; Tulloch pleaded guilty to murder and is serving life without possibility of parole.

Wielding The Ultimate Hammer

Tulloch faced execution if he had been found guilty at trial; at the time of the killings, New Hampshire was one of about two dozen states that allow the death penalty for those younger than 18. In April, the New Hampshire Legislature voted to boost the minimum age to 18, but Gov. Craig Benson has promised a veto.

It's also worth noting that Klebold and Harris had much grander ambitions than they achieved. Propane bombs planted in the school cafeteria failed to ignite on schedule, foiling their plan to kill hundreds in the explosions, then pick off survivors as they fled the school. Bombs in their cars, set to explode when rescue workers arrived, also were foiled.

Imagine a similarly ghoulish situation in Florida in which a Klebold survived to be taken into custody. In the world according to Crist, the Republican state senator from north Tampa and the eastern two-thirds of Pasco County, prosecutors could not wield the ultimate hammer.

Execution would be off the table. The state would start from its preferred destination point - life without possibility of parole - with trading down its only option.

Misguided Compassion

Crist's compassion is commendable but wrongheaded. What sounds like a position favoring civilization and upwardly mobile humanity ignores the potential and manifestations of youthful evil. Consider the 1998 strangling death of Frank Etheredge by his 15-year- old son, Steven, who, along with two buddies, planned a killing- and-robbery spree from Lakeland to California, beginning with their parents.

Again, no trials were held; the young creeps exchanged pleas for sentences lighter than they would have received if found guilty.

This is not the same as suggesting we ought to lethally inject every juvenile delinquent who comes along. To be sure, judges and juries should be mightily circumspect about sentencing juveniles to death. But the threat of execution focuses a suspect's mind in ways otherwise unavailable.

The good senator should let it alone.

Columnist Tom Jackson can be reached at (813) 948-4219.