LOS ANGELES : Jury Urges Death for 2 in Slayings at Church
Two half-brothers convicted of killing two women in a South Los Angeles church should be put to death, members of a Los Angeles Superior Court jury decided Wednesday.
Albert Lewis, 36, and Richard Oliver, 31, showed no reaction as the jurors’ recommendation, made after one day’s deliberation, was announced in court. The two were found guilty last month of murders at the Mt. Olive Church of God in Christ in 1989.
Parishioners Patronella Luke, 35, and Eddie Mae Lee, 76, were killed and Luke’s husband, Peter, was wounded.
The masked gunmen burst in on services because of a domestic dispute between Lewis and his estranged wife.
Prosecutor Marcia Clark said she was pleased by the jury’s decision: “This was the calculated and premeditated murder of innocent parishioners. They set out to kill good people in prayer.”
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