Strange Thanks: Condemned killer Henry Lee Lucas...

Strange Thanks: Condemned killer Henry Lee Lucas may owe a note of thanks to Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. Lucas’ extradition from Texas’ Death Row to Florida to stand trial for murder is on hold because Joe Mitchell, Florida’s chief investigator and a military reservist, has been sent to Saudi Arabia. Lucas, 54, is under a death sentence in Texas for the 1979 murder of an unidentified female hitchhiker.

Betty, Meet Bart: Baghdad Betty is the name given the woman whose radio broadcasts from the Iraqi capital are supposed to demoralize the U.S. forces in the Saudi desert. But Sgt. Joseph J. Torregrossa said he just gets a laugh: “Let me give you a Baghdad Betty quote: ‘Why are you Americans here? Don’t you know you will die in the desert? While you are here, your wives and girlfriends are dating American movie stars. Movie stars like Tom Selleck, Paul Newman and . . . Bart Simpson!’ ”

Holiday Mood: Convicted murderer Jean Harris is trying to find out if the governor of New York is a soft touch. She is making a low-key appeal to get Mario Cuomo to release her from prison nearly 10 years after her conviction for killing Scarsdale Diet doctor Herman Tarnower. “It’s very personal letters going from Jean to the governor,” Harris’ attorney Michael Kennedy said Monday in New York. “We’re trying to get him in a state of mind where he’s clemency-oriented.”

Staying Power: With former D.C. Mayor Marion Barry out of the spotlight these days, two writers are rushing to print before interest completely fades. Coming in January is “Marion Barry: The Politics of Race” by Washington writer Jonathan Agronsky, which will highlight Barry’s political life, his trial and race relations in the city. Reporter Tom Sherwood is also rushing to finish a screenplay about the “mutually respectful relationship” between Barry, who comes out of segregated Mississippi, and Sherwood, the white reporter from Atlanta who comes out of what he describes as a “redneck tradition.”