XPost: alt.christnet.christianlife, alt.fan.states.missouri, sac.politics   
   XPost: talk.politics.guns   
   From: jclemente@charter.net   
      
   BONNE TERRE, Mo. (AP) — Rowan Ford knew Christopher Collings as “Uncle   
   Chris” after he spent several months living with her family. On Tuesday,   
   Collings was executed for sexually assaulting and killing the child, then   
   dumping her body in a sinkhole outside a small Missouri town.   
      
   Collings, 49, was put to death with a single dose of pentobarbital on   
   Tuesday evening at the state prison in Bonne Terre, Missouri. The   
   execution was the 23rd in the U.S. this year and the fourth in Missouri.   
   Only Alabama with six and Texas with five have performed more executions   
   in 2024.   
      
   Collings spoke with a spiritual adviser who was at his side as the process   
   began. Shortly thereafter, the inmate appeared to breathe heavily and   
   swallow hard. After a few seconds, all movement stopped. He was officially   
   declared dead nine minutes after the injection.   
      
   Collings’ fate was sealed Monday when the U.S. Supreme Court turned aside   
   an appeal and Republican Gov. Mike Parson denied clemency.   
      
   “Right or wrong I accept this situation for what it is,” Collings said in   
   a written final statement. “To anyone that I have hurt in this life I am   
   sorry. I hope that you are able to get closure and move on.” He added, “I   
   hope to see you in heaven one day.”   
      
   Parson, in a statement, said he hopes that “all those who knew and loved   
   Rowan may find peace in knowing that justice has been done.”   
      
   Rowan was a fourth-grader described by teachers at Collings’ trial as a   
   hard-working and happy student, a lover of Barbie who had her room painted   
   pink. Collings was a friend of Rowan’s stepfather, David Spears, and lived   
   for several months in 2007 at the home Rowan shared with her mother,   
   Colleen Munson, and Spears. Collings sometimes helped Rowan with her   
   homework.   
      
   Collings told authorities that he drank heavily and smoked marijuana with   
   Spears and another man in the hours before the attack on Rowan, according   
   to court records. Collings said he picked up the still-sleeping child from   
   her bed, took her to the camper where he lived, and assaulted her.   
      
   Collings planned to take Rowan back home, leading her outside the camper   
   facing away from him so that she couldn’t identify him, he said in his   
   confession. But when moonlight lit up the darkness, Rowan was able to see   
   Collings, he told police. He said he “freaked out,” grabbed a rope from a   
   nearby pickup truck, and strangled her.   
      
   Munson returned home from work at 9 a.m. on Nov. 3 and was alarmed when   
   she couldn’t find Rowan, walking the neighborhood looking for her. Court   
   records said Spears insisted Rowan was at a friend’s house. But when Rowan   
   failed to return home by the afternoon, the mother called the police,   
   prompting a massive search.   
      
   Collings, Spears and the third man became the focus of police attention   
   because they were the last people seen at Rowan’s home. Collings confessed   
   to the crime and told police that after killing Rowan, he took the body to   
   a sinkhole. He burned the rope used in the attack, along with the clothes   
   he was wearing and his blood-stained mattress, prosecutors said.   
      
   Court documents and the clemency petition said Spears also implicated   
   himself in the crimes. A transcript of Spears’ statement to police, cited   
   in the clemency petition, said Spears told police that Collings handed him   
   a cord and Spears killed Rowan.   
      
   “I choke her with it. I realize she’s gone. She’s … she’s really gone,”   
   Spears said, according to the transcript. Meanwhile, court documents said   
   it was Spears who led authorities to the sinkhole where the body was   
   found.   
      
   But Spears was allowed to plead to lesser charges. It wasn’t clear why.   
   Prosecutors at the original trial didn’t respond to messages seeking   
   comment.   
      
   Spears served more than seven years in prison before being released in   
   2015. No phone listing for him could be found.   
      
   Collings’ attorney, Jeremy Weis, said the inmate was a loving father and a   
   changed man in prison and didn’t deserve to die, despite his crimes.   
      
   “We share Chris’s desire that his death will provide a measure of closure   
   for the victim’s family and that the people hurt by him will be able to   
   carry on,” Weis said in a statement. “What occurred today, though, was an   
   act of vengeance, but it will not define Chris, nor will it be how we   
   remember him.”   
      
   __   
      
   The last name of the victim’s mother has been corrected to Munson, not   
   Spears.   
      
   https://ktla.com/news/ap-us-news/ap-missouri-man-facing-execution-in-the-   
   sexual-assault-and-strangling-of-a-9-year-old-girl/   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)