State supreme court rejects effort to block McGehee execution

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     The Arkansas Supreme Court has rejected an effort to block the execution of a man convicted of the 1996 murder of a Boone County teen. The justices denied a motion Thursday to block the execution of 40 year old Jason McGehee, one of eight inmates scheduled to be put to death in April by lethal injection.
     McGeehee's lawyer had requested his death sentence be vacated and sent to a lower court for resentencing claiming there were problems with the verdict forms at his resentencing. The motion was filed by McGehee's lawyers two weeks before Governor Hutchinson scheduled the executions last month. The state announced recently there was an adequate supply of the lethal injection drugs to proceed with the executions, which are to take place over a 10 day period in April.
     McGehee was convicted in January, 1998 by a Baxter County jury of the brutal murder of 15 year old John Thomas Melbourne, Jr. of Harrison. In addition to the capital murder conviction, the jury convicted him of kidnapping.
    McGehee was one of three men convicted of kidnapping and murdering Melbourne in August of 1996. McGehee, who was 20 at the time of the murder, was considered the ringleader of a group of teens involved in petty crimes in the area. The other two men involved in the crime, 38 year old Benjamin MacFarland and 40 year old Christopher Epps, were sentenced to life in prison without parole.

 

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