Casper Star-Tribune from Casper, Wyoming • 1

SPORTS NATIONAL fe. 1 1 WEATHER 1 sOTv! Partly sunny, brisk winds A2 Ed berg, heat defeat Lendl B5 Loses home, loses tepee B8 12 I FOREIGN OQ'Xi; Only nine survive A2 I i ji I it tf mr i it ii fiutt i in if i up" pip Wyoming's Statewide Newspaper 1 Casper, Wyoming Wednesday, January 22, 1992 Founded in 1891 Mark Mopldnsoii execiiltedl ait roen r- i' L.L r- i "ti' M-mm nn i ni iiTnm x.a.- i rtriiiiru urnr ut 1,1 AP punishment and to my personal beliefs in this particular case and have exercised what I viewed as my responsibility as governor." HOPKINSON State prison of poc prison other than Jim Taylor had any involvement whatsoever in Jeff Green's death. Mark Hopkinson 12a.m. "Gerry Spence is a lying manipulating peace (sic) of shit. The governor could have proved this case against me was a lie.

The attorney general's office will continue to try and justify their case. Thank you, Mark. "P.S. I feel sorry for the Vehar family but you got the wrong man. Forgive them for they know not what they do." His last statements were provided verbatim with Hopkinson's own spelling.

Hopkinson, an Evanston land Please see HOPKINSON, A12 1 By ANGELA PELKEY and CANDY MOULTON Star-Tribune staff writers RAWLINS Convicted murderer Mark Hopkinson, 42, was executed at the Wyoming State Penitentiary in Rawlins early this morning, according to a statement from the governor's office. Following the execution, Gov. Mike Sullivan issued a statement at 1:05 a.m. in which he said, "We have all suffered through and to this finality. Be assured one can feel only sadness that an execution has occurred.

As governor, there is an added sorrow. "I have remained true to my personal beliefs regarding capital ficials provided several final statements from the condemned man shortly after midnight. Hopkinson's execution is the first in the state since 1965. In a final statement provided to reporters at 12:30 a.m., Hopkinson wrote, "My last words: I would like this to serve as a dying declaration. Nobody I called from Lom- Hopkinson's moUier, Norma Jean Ellsworth, attends a vigil in a Rawlins church Anti-death penalty advocates hold prayer vigils around state Final appeals rejected By JOAN BARRON Star-Tribune capital bureau "State Supported Murder is Still Murder," "An Eye for An Eye Leaves Us AH Blind," and "No More Victims." "I think the people of the state need to lead the governor and the Legislature into a new way of thinking," Wyoming Episcopal Bishop Bob Gordon Jones said in Rawlins." In Casper, about 40 people attended a prayer vigil at St.

Anthony's Catholic Church. Msgr. James O'Neill led the group in prayer for forgiveness "for the ways life is not respected as a people, as a state, as a nation." The Casper group heard readings from Genesis. "The message," O'Neill said, "is let us not kill him." Another candlelight vigil was scheduled to be held on Casper Mountain. Please see VIGIL, A12 By CANDY MOULTON Star-Tribune correspondent with staff reports RAWLINS About 40 people from throughout Wyoming assembled at a Rawlins church just before midnight Tuesday, preparing for a last-minute vigil in bitter cold at the boundary of the Wyoming State Penitentiary to protest the execution of condemned murderer Mark Hopkinson.

Other anti-death penalty protestors gathered for vigils in Casper and Cheyenne. At the state Capitol, about two dozen people gathered on the state Capitol grounds under the window of Gov. Mike Sullivan's office at 1 1 p.m. Tuesday. Members of the Cheyenne group organized by Amnesty International carried signs asserting, AP A highway patrolman blocks passage to the Wyoming State Penitentiary as part of security arrangements Muiiker's frantic efforts end in quiet submission CHEYENNE Condemned killer Mark Hopkinson lost his final desperate series of appeals Tuesday when the U.S.

Supreme Court, the Wyoming Supreme Court, and U.S. District Judge Clarence Brimmer refused to halt his post-midnight execution for ordering the 1979 torture-murder of Jeffrey Lynn Green. Hopkinson filed his last appeal late Tuesday. Acting as his own attorney, he filed a 75-page petition in Brimmer's court in Cheyenne that appeared to contain essentially the same material reviewed by U.S. District Judge Richard Matsch of Denver.

Matsch on Dec. 18 upheld Hopkinson's conviction and death sentence and the Wyoming Supreme Court immediately set Hopkinson's execution date for before dawn on Jan. 22. In the last minute flurry of legal action Tuesday: The Wyoming Supreme Court rejected Public Defender Leonard Munker's Jan. 17 peti- Pleasc see APPEALS, All countdown to execution left arguments, pleadings and paper work to Barbara Lauer, a special assistant public defender, and Norman Newlon, an attorney in private practice who has long experience with the Hopkinson case.

But since Munker is the only member of the defense team licensed to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court, he said he had to remain close at hand throughout Tuesday to sign all communications with the nation's highest court. He said he included in the additional materials sent to the court the petition which Hopkinson filed Monday in his own behalf, naming two California men he claims actually killed Please see MUNKER, A12 By KATHARINE COLLINS Star-Tribune staff writer CHEYENNE State Public Defender Leonard Munker on Tuesday displayed a varying mixture of hope and resignation as the clock wound down to the execution of his client Mark Hopkinson. He said during an interview shortly before noon that he'd learned early Tuesday morning of a request from U.S. Supreme Court clerks handling the Hopkinson case for "more information on the case." That was an indication, he said, that Hopkinson's final appeal in the federal judicial system was not being rejected out of hand.

"I knew by nine they wanted more material," Munker said. "They asked for a poverty affidavit, and they wanted to know the status of the case in the Wyoming Supreme Court. They wanted to wrap everything up in a neat ball." The high court request for details set off a flurry of fax communications between Munker's office and Washington, and then a long period of waiting before the court rejected the appeal. Munker, in poor health and obviously feeling the strain of the litigation and attention accompanying a death penalty case, has for the most part during Hopkinson's most recent LEONARD MUNKER Reprieve never came Saudis to reduce output But oil prices continue retreat on world market High court to review restrictions on abortion INDEX Casper Area A3 Classified B9-12 Comics B3-4 A7 B3 Landers B4 A9-11 Omarr Markets A6 Movies B8 Obituaries, Diary B2 Opinion A8 Sports B5-7 Wyoming 1 Old Grouch Uinta, Teton residents seek minimal impact from reapportionment By JEFF GEARINO Southwestern Wyoming bureau ROCK SPRINGS Legislators should honor the "sanctity" of county lines in any new reapportionment scheme it selects for legislative consideration, a former Uinta County legislator told a legislative committee here Tuesday. And Steve Thomas, chairman of the Teton County Commissioners, told the Legislature's Joint Corporations, Elections and Political Subdivisions Interim Committee, "we implore you to consider the isolation and heritage and culture of a small mountain valley community" when dividing the new districts.

The comments were offered during the second of two hearings scheduled by the committee on four proposed plans for creating new legislative districts in the state. The plans include both single-member and multi-member districting schemes. Hight Proffit, who served Uinta County in the state senate, said the court-ordered legislative reapportionment of voting districts in the state was "completely wiping out the work that has been done for many years to get unity" in such counties as Uinta and Sweetwater in southwest Wyoming. "The sanctity of the county line needs to be honored in some way" in the redistricting plans, Proffit said. "We're losing the identification of the counties." Thomas presented the committee with Teton's own re-districting outline, which Thomas said would "be more fair to our county and to neighboring Sublette and Lincoln coun-Please see REAPPORTIONMENT, A12 di Arabia, Venezuela, Libya, Nigeria, Iran, Algeria and Qatar have pledged reductions adding up to 340,000 barrels a day.

That amounts to a tiny fraction of the cartel's overall supply of some 24 million barrels a day. "These are all gestures," said Bahman Karbassioun, an oil consultant in Vienna. "Their significance is that (the producers) have recognized they have to do something for the second quarter and it has to be something he said. In announcing the Saudi cut, Oil Minister Hisham Nazer said the recent fall in prices was not justified. Oil is about $5 per barrel cheaper since October.

Qatar, a small Persian Gulf producer, said earlier in the day it would lop 10 percent off its output, estimated at about 400,000 barrels a day. In oil futures markets, traders apparently concluded the OPEC members have not done enough cutting. Light sweet crude oil for delivery in February fell 42 cents a barrel, to a final price of 1 8.47, in Tuesday's session on the New York Mercantile Exchange. A day earlier, the price had fallen 27 cents a barrel. BRUSSELS, Belgium (AP) OPEC heavyweight Saudi Arabia joined the ranks of cartel members who have cut their oil output, saying Tuesday it would reduce production by 100,000 barrels a day in an effort to lift weak prices.

But analysts said the amount cut from the kingdom's output of some 8.4 million barrels a day was too little to reduce the glut of oil on the market. Prices kept sliding. The Saudis may have made the cuts only to head off criticism at next month's meeting of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, analysts said. Saudi Arabia produces more than a third of OPEC's oil, but it has been unwilling in recent OPEC meetings to discuss production cuts. "This way they can't be accused of not doing anything," said Peter Bogin, associate director for oil markets at Cambridge Energy Research Associates in Paris.

Demand is expected to drop in the oil-consuming nations as the seasons change, and some OPEC members have feared a glut of crude could push prices sharply lower. In all, seven producers Sau I believe now he'll find eternal justice and mercy. WASHINGTON (AP) The Supreme Court set the stage Tuesday for an important election-year ruling on abortion, agreeing to review a Pennsylvania law that imposes waiting periods and other restrictions on abortions. Activists on both sides of the abortion debate said they expect the court to use the Pennsylvania case to undermine, if not overturn, its landmark 1973 Roe vs. Wade ruling legalizing abortion.

They said the decision likely will make abortions far more difficult to obtain even if states are not allowed to outlaw virtually all abortions. "One of two things will happen and either will be good," said Douglas Johnson of the National Right to Life Committee. "They may use this case to re-examine and overturn Roe. Or they may stop well short of that but still uphold the Pennsylvania law's provisions." Harvard law professor Lau-; rence Tribe predicted that the most likely result will be a close- Please see ABORTION, A12 RESULTS The Star-Tribune Classified Section is not just for selling unwanted items! If there is something you would like to buy or trade for, don't wait for someone else to place a 'For Sale' ad in the running your own advertisement in 136-Want to BuyTrade. Right now, you can buy a classified ad there for just $6 for 7 daysl Just call 266-0555 or 1-800-442-6916 (In WY toll-free) for more detailsl.