Court Upholds Death Sentence
Associated Press
SAN FRANCISCO —
The state Supreme Court today upheld the death sentence of a Sacramento man for the 1980 murder of a 78-year-old Sacramento woman who suffered a fatal heart attack while being beaten during a break-in at her apartment.
The unanimous ruling rejected arguments by lawyers for Manuel Babbitt, 39, that he should have been found insane or not criminally responsible because of brain damage suffered in a childhood injury and aggravated when he was wounded as a soldier in Vietnam.
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