DATE: Saturday, October 25, 1997            TAG: 9710250404

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B7   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: FROM WIRE REPORTS

                                            LENGTH:   93 lines

VIRGINIA

White men indicted

in the burning and

beheading of black

INDEPENDENCE - Two white men accused of dousing a black man with gasoline and burning him alive after a night of heavy drinking, then beheading his corpse, were indicted Friday on murder charges.

The Grayson County grand jury found there was enough evidence to charge Louis Ceparano, 42, with capital murder and Emmett Cressell Jr., 36, with first-degree murder.

Both men were also indicted on a robbery charge for allegedly taking the victim's watch during an all-night party.

No trial date has been set.

Police say Ceparano and Cressell, along with two women, had been drinking heavily at a party at Ceparano's trailer in mountainous Grayson County before they attacked Garnett P. Johnson, 40, on July 25.

During an October hearing, one of the women, Christy Harden, testified that Johnson begged the two men to ``just shoot me'' as they carried him outside the trailer.

A sheriff's deputy testified that when he arrived at the trailer, he found Johnson's body still smoldering and his head lying in a hole that had been dug nearby.

Ceparano could be sentenced to death if he is convicted. Cressell could be sentenced to life in prison.

One woman at the party, Hazel Louise Anderson, told The Associated Press in August that one of the men said they would take Johnson outside, ``put him on that white cross and burn him.''

The Justice Department is investigating whether the July 25 killing of Johnson was a racially motivated hate crime.

Representatives of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference are monitoring the case.

Jimmy Turk, Ceparano's attorney, said he will file a motion asking Circuit Judge Colin Campbell to move the trial because of the pre-trial publicity.

``I don't see how there is any way he can get a fair trial in Grayson County,'' Turk said. NORTHERN

Jury finds man guilty

of drugging, raping teen

MANASSAS - A jury has convicted a 20-year-old man of drugging a teen-age girl by slipping a powerful sedative into her soft drink and then raping her.

The Prince William County jury also convicted Matthew James Morris on Thursday of contributing to the delinquency of a minor, a misdemeanor.

The jury recommended a seven-year prison term on the rape conviction, 13 years on the drugging charge and 12 months on the misdemeanor.

Morris' sentencing is set for Dec. 19.

His attorney said an appeal is planned.

Morris testified that the 15-year-old girl was a willing participant in sex and asked to see the pills of the sedative Rohypnol he had obtained in Florida.

Rohypnol, the so-called ``date rape pill,'' can make a person pass out quickly and retain no memory of what happens afterward. The small, white tablets are tasteless and show no trace when dissolved in a drink.

A co-defendant, Brandon M. Kelly, 20, is scheduled for trial Nov. 3 on charges of rape, forcible sodomy, dispensing a controlled substance and contributing to the delinquency of a minor involving the other girl.

SOUTHSIDE

Family of misdiagnosed

woman awarded $2 million

PETERSBURG - A jury has awarded $2 million to the family of a woman who died of bacterial pneumonia about 16 hours after she was misdiagnosed by an emergency room doctor as having the flu.

The Circuit Court jury deliberated six hours Thursday before making the award to the family of Elnora Pulliam, who died Dec. 15, 1995, after going to Southside Regional Medical Center with flu-like symptoms.

The verdict was against Dr. Thomas Anthony DiGiovanna, the doctor who treated Pulliam and sent her home with medication, and Coastal Emergency Services Inc. of Richmond.

Coastal had a contract with Southside Regional Medical Center to provide emergency room physicians and was DiGiovanna's employer.

Pulliam, 41, of Disputanta, was a pre-kindergarten teacher at South Elementary School in Prince George County. She had worked for the county school system for about 17 years.

Pulliam had pneumonia caused by Group A Beta Hemolytic Streptococcus, a dangerous bacterium but one that can be treated with intravenous antibiotics if detected early enough, said Charles H. Cuthbert Jr., the attorney for the woman's family.

Joseph P. McMenamin, the attorney for the doctor and his employer, argued that Pulliam was so sick by the time DiGiovanna saw her that there was nothing that could have been done to save her.

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