The Nation - News from Aug. 17, 1989

The life of condemned murderer Ronald Monroe, 34, was spared in Louisiana when Gov. Buddy Roemer decided to halt a scheduled Aug. 30 execution in the electric chair. Monroe, accused of the 1977 stabbing death of his landlady, is labeled by his attorneys as borderline mentally retarded, and had exhausted all appeals. He has insisted he is innocent for more than a decade. “The evidence is persuasive to me that he is guilty . . . while there is guilt for Monroe, in an execution in this country, the test ought not be reasonable doubt . . . he met the test for guilty but not execution,” Roemer said after meeting with attorneys and one of the victim’s children.