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Show How Heinous Can A Murder Be? It's a dangerous and tragic fact that the BeBee case has become for an ever-increasing number of citizens in this state an ugly symbol. . . a symbol of doubt as to the justice and underlying efficiency of the laws under which we live. This sentiment is naturally strongest among the people peo-ple of Mt. Pleasant who have viewed with increasing dismay dis-may BeBee's apparent success at delaying the hour of retribution for his deliberate and premeditated murder of Mt. Pleasant City Marshal Lon T. Larsen. BeBee shot Lon Larsen in cold blood on the Main street of this community on October 15, 1945. Today, more than three years later, the convicted murderer is still alive and, according to current reports, planning another attempt to escape a just sentence of execution. Let us examine the course of the BeBee case during the past three years. BeBee was originally found guilty of murder in the first degree in the spring of 1946 following a trial by jury in the district court at Manti. District Judge John A. Hougaard sentenced him to die before a firing squad April ) 2, 1946. An appeal to the state supreme court brought an order for retrial on a technicality and upon the request- of the self-confessed slayer for a change of venue, the case was taken to the Price district court for a second jury trial which began August 27, 1947. This second jury found him guilty with a recommendation for life imprisonment which Judge F. W. Keller overuled ordering BeBee to be executed August Aug-ust 11, 1947. The"case was again appealed to the Supreme court which upheld Judge Keller's action, returning BeBee to the Price court to be resentenced. Judge Keller set August 1 1 of this year as the new date for execution, but sentence was temporarily set aside by Governor Herbert B. Maw who granted BeBee a reprieve so that he might appear before a September 16 meeting of the board of pardons with a request re-quest that the death sentence be commuted to life imprisonment. impris-onment. By a 4-3 vote the board refused the request, thus sending send-ing the case back to Judge Keller's court for resentencing. Now there are reports that BeBee will ask for a rehearing re-hearing before the board of pardons. There is no doubt that published dissents of the three members of the board of pardons who voted in BeBee's favor fa-vor at last month's meeting have given just the encouragement encourage-ment BeBee needed to ask for a rehearing. There is not space here to examine the statements made by Supreme Court Justice James H. Wolfe, Eugene E. Pratt and Lester A Wade as to why they favored commutation commuta-tion of the death sentence. The general trend of these statements was summed up by Justice Pratt who said: "I think the legislature intended only the most heinous cases of murder in the first degree should exact the death penalty. . . I think there was no justification for this killing, but I nevertheless believe it is not of such a heinous nature that requires the death penalty." pen-alty." What in heaven's name, ask the people, could you call the murder of Lon Larsen if it wasn't heinous?, Lon Larsen was a highly respected and valuable citizen who was shot down by Hiram BeBee, a man with a criminal record. rec-ord. Lon Larsen had carried out his duties as city marshal prior to the murder. Hiram BeBee had made a public nuisance nuis-ance of himself prior to the murder. Lon Larsen, unarmed, was walking away from his assailant as-sailant at the time he was murdered. Hiram BeBee, fully armed, and sitting in a truck shot the marshall in the back. In view of these facts, the public can come only to one conclusion about Justice Pratt and his type of judicial thinking. It is that justice Pratt and his kind enjoy sentimentalizing senti-mentalizing over the meaning of a big word like heinous while a clear-cut case of murder in the first degree goes unpunished. The people of Mt. Pleasant are not bloodthirsty as partisans of BeEee would claim. They merely ask now, as they asked three years ago that laws guaranteeing the safety of law-abiding citizens be applied to the full limit against the man who murdered the law in Mt. Pleasant. This means the execution of Hiram BeBee without further delay. |