(AP) - Virginia State Police will review the Department of Corrections' investigation of the slaying of a notorious child molester who was killed in his cell, allegedly by another inmate.

Secretary of Public Safety John W. Marshall ordered the review of the death of Richard A. Ausley, who authorities say was strangled and beaten in January by cellmate Dewey Venable at the Sussex I State Prison.

Venable, 24, a violent felon, had been molested as a child and said that he had warned a corrections officer not to put him in the same cell as Ausley, who was 64.

In 1973, Ausley abducted a 13-year-old Portsmouth boy, chained him in an underground box and repeatedly sexually assaulted him.

The Inspector General's office investigated Ausley's slaying, which led to a capital murder charge against Venable but no disciplinary measures against corrections employees. There has been no independent investigation into Ausley's slaying.

Kent Willis, director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, cited the need of an independent agency to oversee Virginia prisons, which are isolated and open to the potential for abuse and neglect.

"In many other states, there are significantly well-funded, independent agencies that advocate for prisoners' rights," Willis said.

Larry Traylor, spokesman for the Department of Corrections, has said that the department's inspector general's office is independent and reports to the secretary of public safety and the Board of Corrections.

However, employees of the inspector general's office report to the director of the Department of Corrections and are employees of the corrections department.

Ausley gained additional notoriety in recent years as the offender who prompted a Virginia law that allows the indefinite confinement of violent sexual predators for treatment once their prison terms are over.

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