California IN BRIEF : VISALIA : Woman Sentenced to Gas Chamber

A convicted murderer dubbed the “black widow” for masterminding the slaying of her elderly husband and forging his Social Security checks has been ordered to die in the gas chamber, becoming only the second woman on California’s Death Row. June Gravlee, 35, of Tulare, slowly shook her head Friday when a court clerk read the one-word verdict--”death”--for the stabbing and beating death of 71-year-old Andrew Gravlee, who was slain by her brother, Gary Smith, on July 17, 1987. Smith, who last summer led authorities to the victim’s skeletal remains buried in the Coast Range mountains, later pleaded guilty to first-degree murder and was sentenced to 25 years in prison. The jury, which found June Gravlee guilty of first-degree murder last month, heard two weeks of testimony in the penalty phase of the trial before deciding on the death penalty in less than five hours of deliberation. Jury Foreman Ron Blackhurst said jurors were uncomfortable with ordering a woman executed but the evidence was clear she had her husband killed for financial gain, an offense punishable by death in California. Prosecutor Phil Cline called June Gravlee a woman without compassion who talked her brother into killing her husband so she could get his Social Security benefits.