Florida Today from Cocoa, Florida • Page 6

6A FLORIDA TODAY, Tuesday, March 24, 1998 Serial killer Stano put to death for Brevard slaying 1,1 "l' i i. I Victims Stano confessed to killing FLORIDA TODAY photos by Craig Rubadoux HEARSE LEAVES Florida State Prison on Monday bearing the body of Gerald Stano. twice in the head. 14. Molly Newell, 20, of Tampa, who was recently divorced and looking for work, her body was found near the Gandy Bridge, in St.

Petersburg. 1 5. Emily Grieve, 28. killed in Pasco County in 1 977. 16.

Phoebe Winston, 23, killed in Polk County in 1979. 17. Mary Kathleen Muldoon, 23, a Daytona Beach Community College student. She was shot and drowned Nov. 12, 1977, in New Smyrna Beach.

Stano sentenced to death. 18. Sandra DuBose, 34, killed in August 1978 by gunshot to head. 19. Christine Goodson, 17, killed in St.

Petersburg in 1979. 20. Dorothy Williams, 17, high school dropout who worked as prostitute in Tampa, killed Dec. 10, 1979. 21.

Mary Carol Maher, 20, of Daytona Beach, a junior college student was a champion swimmer, was found stabbed to death Jan. 10, 1980. Stano admitted to taking a knife beneath his seat and plunging it in her chest as they drove in Daytona Beach. Stano was sentenced to life in prison. 22.

Tonl Van Haddocks, 26, who had previous prostitution arrests, was found with 51 stab wounds in her body on Feb. 1 5, 1 980, in Holly Hill. Stano is under a life sentence in the case. 23. Jane Doe, 18-23, skeletal remains found Nov.

5, 1980, in the median of Interstate 95 near Port Orange. Stano said the woman was a prostitute he choked to death in 1978 or 1979. No charges filed in accordance with plea agreement. 24. Diana Lynn Valleck, killed in Tampa, 1975.

25. Rose Oliver, killed in Polk County in 1976. 26. Enid Branch, killed in Hillsborough County in 1 976. 27.

Madame killed in 1974 in Seminole County. 28. Jane Doe, killed in Hillsborough County. And other murders in New Jersey, Georgia and Pennsylvania. STANO, From 1A Medina died, but the incident caused a yearlong delay in executions while attorneys argued whether use of the 75-year-old chair was cruel and unusual punishment.

The courts ultimately ruled the state could continue using the chair. At 7 a Stano was helped into the execution chamber at Florida State Prison in Starke. By 7:05 a.m., prison workers had strapped his head onto the chair, and a copper skull cap had been tied onto his shaved head. Stano chose not to make a last statement, instead saying it would be available from his attorney, Lissa Gardner, after he was dead. In the statement, he thanked his lawyers, friends and family, but denied killing anyone, despite his repeated confessions.

"I confessed to crimes I did not commit," he wrote. "I was not strong enough. It is hard for a person who has never been in jail, completely isolated, and without any help, to understand that a person will confess to something awful they did not do." At 7:07 a.m., a worker fiddled with the skull cap for a few seconds. Stano's eyes widened slightly. The worker lowered a black veil over Stano's face.

A few feet from the chair, standing behind a wall with a small window, Florida's anonymous executioner watched and waited a nod, only his eyes visible. A worker wearing insulated gloves attached a cable from a transformer behind the electric chair to a screw at the top of the skull cap. The eyes then darted to a man talking on the telephone to Gov. Lawton Chiles. The man nodded: "Yes." The executioner's eyes focused on Stano.

At 7:09 a.m., the executioner held up a finger from his right hand and turned on the first burst of electricity with his left hand. Stano went rigid. For eight seconds, 2,300 volts traveled into Stano's body through his head and exited through an electrode strapped to his calf. Raymond Neal Ramona Neal's twin brother said "Die. The executioner lifted a second finger, and the voltage was reduced to 1,000 volts for 22 seconds.

He lifted a third finger and increased the voltage to 2,300 volts for eight 1 i i) i RAYMOND NEAL of Houston celebrates Stano's execution Monday. Neal's twin sister was one of Stano's victims. Following is a list of some of the victims of Gerald Stano. He confessed to killing 41 women in Florida, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania: 1. Ann Eugenia Arceneaux, 17, stabbed to death in Gainesville on March 21, 1973.

2. Janine Marie Llgotino, 19, stabbed to death in Gainesville on March 21, 1973. 3. Barbara Bauer, 17, of New Smyrna Beach, reported missing from shopping trip, Sept. 6, 1973.

Her body was found seven months later in North Florida landfill, 100 miles from home. Stano is under a life sentence for her death. 4. Cathy Lee Scharf, 17, of Port Orange, was stabbed to death in Brevard County on Dec. 14, 1973.

Stano was sentenced to death for her slaying. 5. Nancy Heard, 24, a beachside motel maid was found dead Jan. 3, 1975, north of Ormond Beach. Stano under life sentence for slaying.

6. Diana Lynn Valleck, 18. 7. Susan Basille, 12, of Port Orange, was killed in June 1975. 8.

Linda Ann Hamilton, 16, a student from Millbury, disappeared on Monday, July 21, 1975, from Daytona Beach. Her nude body found the next day near Turtle Mound. Stano confessed to murder on March 12, 1981. 9. Susan Bickrest, 24, strangled and then drowned on Spruce Creek on Dec.

29, 1975. A waitress, she was found floating face down by two fishermen. Stano serving to life. 10. Bonnie Hughes, 34, killed in Polk County in 1976.

1 1 Ramona Neal, 1 9, of Forest Park, was in Daytona Beach with friends celebrating their graduation from high school. After quarreling with her boyfriend, she encountered Stano on June 15, 1976. Her body was discovered at Tomoka State Park. 12. Emily Branch, 21.

13. Joan Gail Foster, 18, left Memphis, in September 1977 and came to Tampa, where she took a job as a nude dancer. Her body was found a week later in a Pasco County orange grove. She was shot Morris said Stano's elderly parents, Eugene and Norma Stano, and sister-in-law, Judy Stano, said goodbye during an hourlong visit Friday morning. Celeste Fausel, who witnessed the execution, had asked Stano to meet with her, but he declined.

Stano killed Fausel's sister, Mary Carol Maher, on Jan. 20, 1980. "I forgave him a long time ago," she said. "I really didn't want to see the execution, but I wanted to look at him. I wanted to see him." well send coupon to savings at Surf Shnn.

your Ron Jon When you in FLORIDA Classified "He asked me to be there and I accepted," said the minister of Highlands Presbyterian Church in Gainesville. Lyda stayed with Stano through the night leading up to his execution. "He was calm, but obviously very scared," Lyda said later. "He was very friendly but resolute to go through with this." Lyda was with Stano from about 9:30 p.m. Sunday until he finished his last meal about 5:30 a.m.

Monday. Morris said Stano ate a Delmo-nico steak, a baked potato with sour cream and bacon bits, lima beans, a tossed salad, a half-gallon of mint chocolate chip ice cream and drank two liters of Dr. Pepper. Unlike his sister, John Maher was jubilant at Stano's death, smoking a celebratory cigar with the Neal brothers. "As he lived his life, he was misguided, demented," Maher said of Stano.

With that, he turned to Raymond Neal to say goodbye. "I wish I'd never met you," Raymond Neal said to Maher. "Me too," Maher replied, and they embraced. Jones loses last-minute appeal next purchase at Surf Shop. place an ad TODAY'S MlX iSsFT Marketplace, pyHf U-qCQ k0 I In you a get 15 Mk'M 1 Ron Jon vtyffh Now.

that's II0E JHnD Court denies lawyer's plea for more time Associated Press TALLAHASSEE A man set to be electrocuted early today for the 1981 murder of a police officer lost appeals to a federal trial judge and the Florida Supreme Court less than 24 hours before his scheduled execution. In Monday's appeal in U.S. District Court, Leo Jones' lawyer said his office was out of money and couldn't properly represent him. Attorney Martin McClain said he planned to appeal to the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta, which turned down another appeal Sunday.

Later Monday, the Florida Supreme Court denied a request from McClain for a postponement based on a phone call from a jail guard who told McClain lots of inmates in 1981 said Glen Schofield confessed to the murder. The guard is the latest of about a dozen people who have said Schofield claimed he killed the officer. awesome selection of OF A HI" merchandise. Cocoa Buck, FL. Sad to say, this offer can't last forever, so place your ad today! By phone, fax or in person we're waiting to hear from you! THE REV.

FRED RUSE of Winter Haven prays Monday during the execution of Stano. more seconds. He then turned off the power. The cable was removed from Stano's head, and the executioner looked away. For killing Stano, he'd be paid $150.

Two doctors checked Stano and declared him dead at 7:15 a.m. "It was great to see some justice done," said Raymond Neal, a police officer in Houston. "You hate to see anyone strapped down like that, but this guy was a monster." Stano, a former short-order cook from Daytona Beach, was the 40th inmate executed since Florida reinstated the death penalty in 1972. He was the 237th to die in the electric chair since 1924. The resumption of executions in Florida has fueled the debate over the use of capital punishment.

A few hours later, the high court refused to reconsider its decision, leaving Jones little recourse except the fed-eral courts. Rnth orders JONES were5-2. Jones, 47, was to be executed in Florida's 75-year-old electric chair this morning 24 hours after confessed serial killer Gerald Stano was put to death and a week before two other convicted killers were set to die. Stano's execution was Florida's first since a foot-long flame flared during the execution of Pedro Medina last March 25. The state Supreme Court ruled last fall that death in Florida's electric chair is neither cruel nor unusual.

Police Officer Thomas Szafran-ski was shot while sitting in his patrol car at a Jacksonville intersection. Jones confessed but later accused police of beating the confession out of him. Florida's high court last week denied Jones' appeal that he deserved a new trial based on new She also was convicted of trying to blow up her fiance, John Gentry, with a car bomb in downtown Pensacola in 1QR3 BUENOANO A boyfriend of Buenoano also died under mysterious circumstances in 1978, when they were living together in Trinidad, Colo. Colorado authorities decided not to charge her after the Florida convictions. In all four cases, Buenoano was the beneficiary of life insurance policies.

She was convicted and sentenced to terms of life and 12 years for murdering her son and for attempting to kill her fiance. In the television interview, Buenoano denied killing her husband, her boyfriend and son. However, she said she felt responsible for her son's death during a canoe outing. "I feel responsible for that. I feel responsible for him being there," Buenoano said.

Buenoano said she thinks the jury convicted her of killing her husband because they were told Speaking on behalf of the Amnesty International human-rights group, Bianca Jagger, former wife of Rolling Stones rocker Mick Jagger, told reporters Sunday that Florida politicians were "killing for votes." State Department of Corrections spokesman Gene Morris said Monday's execution drew more politicians than any during the past seven years. State Sen. Charles Williams, R-Tallahassee, and Sen. Locke Burt, D-Ormond Beach, were among the 12 official witnesses, who also included the Neal brothers, Gardner, and Stano's "spiritual adviser," the Rev. Clifford Lyda.

Stano contacted Lyda three weeks ago on the advice of his lawyers. evidence. Another issue still pending before the high court could delay Jones' execution. In a petition filed almost two months ago by McClain's boss, Peter Warren Kenny asked the state Supreme Court for an across-the-board stay for all cases handled by his Miami-based office, which Kenny said was nearly out of money. That would include delays in the executions scheduled for Jones and convicted killer Daniel Remeta.

In a similar but separate appeal, a private law firm has asked for a moratorium on all executions because of a funding crisis for the state's death row lawyers. The state's high court has scheduled hearings but has said the appeal would not cover this month's four scheduled executions. Judy Buenoano, 54, dubbed the "black widow," is condemned to die on March 30 for the 1971 arsenic poisoning of her husband, James Goodyear. Remeta, 40, was to be executed on March 31 for the February 1985 fatal shooting of Mehrle "Chet" Reeder, a convenience store clerk in Ocala. about all the allegations against her, not just the crime for which she was being tried.

"I would find myself guilty if I heard what was going on," said Buenoano, who was interviewed at Broward Correctional Institution in Pembroke Pines, outside Fort Lauderdale. "You have to let a case stand on its own. You can't take something from here and something from here." Her daughter, Kimberly Hawkins, told CNN that she thinks her mother didn't kill her father or brother. "I feel my mother is innocent. She didn't commit the crime that they are saying she is guilty of," Hawkins said.

"I was there during the trial, and I saw what a joke it was, and how people were badgered and coerced They perjured themselves on the witness stand." Her lawyers contend newly discovered records cast doubt on the accuracy of evidence processed by the FBI crime laboratory. They say the government has stonewalled them in their efforts to get the records. Buenoano is scheduled to be the third person executed jfi Florida in eight days. 0 IIhP. 'Black widow' denies three slayings J.

l.K.Aw' JUULttJ iJJwAi, K.A lri Offer available to individuals placing ads to sett personal merchandise. Ads must be placed during the month of March to receive 15 off Ron Jon coupon. Must present coupon at time of purchase. 9 i 'f-'lV Buenoano wants to be remembered as a good mother Associated Press PEMBROKE PINES The first woman to die in Florida's electric chair for killing her husband wants to be remembered as a good mother despite her conviction for drowning her 19-year-old paraplegic son. Judy Buenoano, 54, said in a prison interview broadcast Monday on CNN's legal show, "Burden of Proof," she wanted to be remembered "as a good mother" after she is electrocuted Monday.

Dubbed Florida's "black widow" by prosecutors, Buenoano was sentenced to die in the state's electric for the 1971 arsenic poisoning death of her husband, James Goodyear, three months after he returned to Orlando from Vietnam. The cause of death was not discovered until after she moved to the Panhandle, where she was convicted of drowning her disabled son, Michael in a Santa Rosa County rivkr in 1980. "5 FLORIDA TODAY iyii Pfoioinie- mow puts you in touch.