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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (March 29, 1984)
Thursday, March 29, 1984/The Battalion/Page 5 iney Com i Miss Souil id Miss Wes; Antonio >eople from! n San Am during i| t | pageant in ; all the moiij said, see tears ou knowjuj iP u > igif United Press International HUNTSVILLE — “Candy- in” killer Ronald Clark Bryan, nearing execution Brday for poisoning his son th Halloween candy, came ace to face Wednesday with the ifather of one of his intended [ms and pleaded his inno- Je. h’ve stated from the begin- |g that I had absolutely no- at all to do with this, and I itain that now,” O'Bryan efense lawyer Will Gray late Wednesday filed in Houston ral court a writ of habeas |us and a request for a stay of ^pending execution. Gray noted that several jurors been improperly disqual- still pleading if led from O’Bryan’s trial in 1974. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in Austin Wednesday denied without explanation O’Bryan’s request for a stay, re moving one more hurdle be tween the 39-year-old former optician and death by lethal in jection. An attorney for the Houston chapter of the American Civil Liberties also filed suit Wednes day in federal court asking for a preliminary injunction because he said the method of execution was “cruel and unusual punish ment.” Attorney Stefan Presser noted in his suit that the Food and Drug Administration is re quired by Congress to test all drugs to make sure they are safe and produce their intended use. He said the testing had not been done. He claimed the method of execution was cruel because it took death row inmate James Autry 15 minutes to die after the injection was administered to him earlier this month. A jury convicted O’Bryan of feeding his 8-year-old son Timothy a cyanide-laced Giant Pixy Stix on a stormy Halloween night in 1974 to collect $31,000 insurance money. Prosecutors said O’Bryan gave Timothy Kool-aid to wash down the poison. O’Bryan’s daughter, Eli zabeth, who was six then, and three neighbor children — in cluding Whitney Parker — also received the candy. Only Timothy ate it. his innocence to media The Parker boy’s stepfather, Charles Hudgins, publisher of a weekly community newspaper, was one of two dozen reporters who spoke with O’Bryan in an interview area off death row. Hudgins had a private five- minute conversation with O’Bryan and afterward said he pressed the inmate for a final explanation. “I asked him why he has not cried out loudly about author ities not catching the right per son — if he is not that person,” Hudgins said. “The only thing he said is that he’s written let ters.” It was the first meeting be tween the former neighbors since Timothy’s funeral two days before O’Bryan was charged in his son’s death. “I also asked him if he thinks he is innocent, why has he not corresponded with us and the Bates family, and tried to con vince us of this,” Hudgins said. “Again, the only thing I got from him was that he didn’t know what to say to us.” Mark and Kim Bates, chil dren of another former O’Bryan neighbor, Jimmy Bates, also received poisoned candy. Bates, who trick or tre ated with O’Bryan and the kids, has told United Press Interna tional he has no doubt about O’Bryan’s guilt. Hudgins traveled 100 miles from Pasadena, where he pub lishes the weekly Free News En terprise, to speak to O’Bryan for “various” reasons. He declined to characterize the meeting due to his position as a workingjour- nalist. Prior the private meeting, O’Bryan took questions from re porters including a television crew from the Phil Donahue Show. When asked if he was fearful of dying by an overdose of drugs, he said, “No. I’ve always associated fear with guilt, and guilt with fear. Because I have no guilt and because I know I didn’t do it, and the people close to me know I could not have done it, and because the Lord knows I didn’t do it. I’ve got no thing to be scared about.” O’Bryan claims the evidence which convicted him “had no basis in fact.” He said it was “100 percent circumstantial” and that he was a scapegoat for a panic- stricken neighborhood. O’Bryan said he does not know who the killer might be and that he is tortured by the thought of so many people hat ing him. Fellow death row in mates call him “Candyman.” “When I die,” O’Bryan said, “I know where I’m going. They can lock up my body but not my mind or my spirit.” He said that in the last week he has filled out paper work necessary for the execution and that officials have reviewed the procedure with him. If executed, O’Bryan will be the third Texas inmate to be put to death since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the Texas death penalty in the early 1970s. shocked.! issian onli o the audiel lincing. HtiJ s in Russian d a strongi the progd wore they irm. I it would (a Russian ol to discuss When the ij of Russia antes fromh Agency, the is of the a presentai iolemn march marks >rd anniversary of TMI United Press International [MIDDLETOWN, Pa. — ige cooling towers looming pre them, about 150 people Iched solemnly Wednesday Three Mile Island nuclear it and cheered Jesse Jack- call for a permanent clos- lof the facility. Ill is time to close this plant , #/\l« ver > ^e Democratic pres- u Cl Vidal candidate told marchers ^ ^ lithe fifth anniversary of the It accident in U.S. commer- al nuclear power history, lere must be a better way, I we oppose the restart of MI Unit 1.” >1 Hill, SenM aders explckson is the only Democra- :agan’s eititforesidential hopeful to come )r El Salvai out against the plant reopening and nuclear power. March organizers said 1984 is a crucial year in their fight to get TMI’s damaged Unit 2 cleaned up and to keep the undamaged Unit 1 from being restarted. The candlelight vigil began at 3:30 a.m. EST with a half-mile procession in a steady rain to the gates of the southcentral Penn sylvania plant, followed by five minutes of silence at 4 a.m. The plant began to lose cool ing water and its Unit 2 reactor overheated at 4 a.m. on March 28, 1979. Golorado Sen. Gary Hart, another Democratic presiden tial hopeful, got a mixed reac tion in nearby Harrisburg last week when he said the undam aged unit should not be res tarted until it is proven safe and area residents’ opinions have been heard. The marchers carried blue and orange globed candles and displayed signs reading, “The Public Will Shut TMI,” and “Keep TMI Shut.” They sang traditional protest and folk songs before ending the observ ance. The Nuclear Regulatory Com mission has scheduled a June vote on whether to allow the un damaged reactor back into ser vice. 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