Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SATURDAY, November 4, 1995 TAG: 9511050005
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: TODD JACKSON STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
A judge on Friday set a Dec. 28 execution date for convicted murderer Walter Correll Jr.
It is the second execution date Correll has faced.
Franklin County Circuit Judge B.A. Davis III sentenced Correll to death and set a Jan. 6, 1987, execution date after Correll was convicted of the 1985 slaying of Charles W. Bousman Jr., 24, of Wirtz.
Davis on Friday set Correll's execution date for the second time.
Appeals have held off Correll's death sentence for more than eight years, and Franklin County Commonwealth's Attorney Cliff Hapgood said additional appeals remain possible.
Correll's lawyer, former Sen. Joe Tydings of Maryland, indicated Friday that he would file an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court regarding an alleged "tainted" confession used to convict his client, Hapgood said.
"I took this case nine years ago because I thought it was a miscarriage of justice," he said. "And I still do."
In the summer of 1994, U.S. District Judge James Turk overturned Correll's conviction and called for a new trial, but the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Turk's decision.
Turk ruled that two confessions Correll made to Franklin County sheriff's investigators violated his right to an attorney and that a third confession was tainted by the first two.
The Court of Appeals found that the third confession was legal.
Correll, now 34, was one of three men convicted of Bousman's slaying.
Correll was the leader of the group, Hapgood argued during the trial.
But Tydings said Correll's IQ of 68 made him a follower, and not a leader.
Bousman's body was found in the Hardy area near Smith Mountain Lake on Aug. 16, 1985, five days after he was killed. He had been choked and stabbed. Investigators said Bousman was attacked in Roanoke by the three men, knocked unconscious, then driven to Franklin County, where he was stabbed.
The Dec. 28 execution date for Correll falls within a 90-day deadline that Tydings has for appealing the 4th Circuit decision, Hapgood said.
Defense lawyers in other capital murder cases - including the one of Dennis Stockton, who was executed Sept. 27 - have argued that the state attorney general's office is deliberately attempting to speed up executions by scheduling them prior to appeal deadlines.
Hapgood said Friday that he doesn't buy that opinion, especially with Correll."
by CNB