The Arkansas Democrat Gazette
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. — The state Parole Board on Monday unanimously recommended that Gov. Mike Beebe deny executive clemency for a death-row inmate who admitted to raping and strangling a Bald Knob bookkeeper and severely beating her daughter 16 years ago.
Beebe has set an Oct. 16 execution date for 43-year-old Jack Harold Jones Jr. A spokesman for the governor said Monday that Beebe has not made a determination on the Jones’ clemency request but has thoroughly read the transcripts of Jones’ trial to make sure that everything was covered.
The board made its recommendation without comment Monday after holding hearings on his clemency request last week.
Jones was convicted in White County Circuit Court of capital murder, rape and criminal attempted capital murder in the June 1991 slaying of Mary Phillips of Bradford.
The murder occurred at a bookkeeping and tax service in Bald Knob where Phillips worked. Her 11-year-old daughter, who was at the business at the time, was tied to a chair and beaten.
Jones has exhausted all of his state and federal appeals but has asked a federal judge to stay his execution while considering his lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the state’s use of lethal injection, the state attorney general’s office said Monday.
Copyright 2007 The Arkansas Democrat Gazette