With All Due Respect, Your Eminence . . .

Cardinal Roger Mahony, the Roman Catholic archbishop of Los Angeles, made some good points this week about why the state should not execute Tommy Thompson on Aug. 5. But his argument that the victim might not have been raped wasn’t one of them. I fear he’s bought into a twisted set of facts.

Thompson is scheduled to die by lethal injection for the 1981 rape and murder of Ginger Fleischli at his Laguna Beach studio apartment. His lawyers lost their latest round for a stay of execution in federal court on Friday.

The cardinal, in a letter to Gov. Pete Wilson appealing for clemency, alludes to arguments by Thompson’s lawyers that there was reasonable doubt that Fleischli was raped. And without the rape, Thompson’s murder conviction does not qualify as a death penalty case.

I’ve already written in this column that after covering Thompson’s 1983 trial, I’m convinced of his guilt in both the rape and the murder. But I feel compelled to write about Cardinal Mahony’s letter because it comes at a time when I’ve also received a passionate plea on Thompson’s behalf from Shirley Leitch of Laguna Beach. She’s a strong opponent of the death penalty, but not at all a bystander in this.

She is the mother of David Leitch, Thompson’s roommate, who is in prison on a second-degree murder conviction for his role in Fleischli’s death. And David Leitch is a key figure in this latest attempt to stay Thompson’s execution.

The heart of Thompson’s lawyers’ latest arguments on the rape is this: that David Leitch admitted at a parole hearing that he came home at one point during the night and found Thompson and Fleischli engaged in consensual sex.

The reasoning by Thompson’s lawyers seems incongruous: that Leitch is truthful when he says he saw consensual sex (which helps Thompson on the rape count) but that he’s lying when he says he came home later and found Thompson standing next to Fleischli’s dead body, wrapped in a blanket (which is no help on the murder count).

In fact, their argument is that Leitch is the lone killer.

But let’s look at the “consensual sex” issue. Is that what David Leitch really said?

Shirley Leitch says yes. But she suggested I talk to her other son, Jeffrey Leitch, who lives in Seattle. When I did, David’s brother said, “In my conversations with David, he says he has no idea if it was consensual sex or not.”

What?

Jeffrey Leitch said David told him he just assumed it was consensual sex because Fleischli did not seem to be fighting Thompson. But rape victims scared out of their minds that they are about to be murdered by a man with a knife don’t always fight back.

So I talked to Leitch’s current lawyer, Gary Diamond of Sacramento, who went even farther than Jeffrey Leitch:

“David has never made the statement he saw consensual sex. It was not what he said at the parole hearing. Thompson’s attorneys would like you to think so. But David’s version has always been consistent: He opened the door, saw two people in bed, one on top of the other, and quickly closed the door out of embarrassment and left.”

Someone had better tell Cardinal Mahony.

There was also evidence that Fleischli’s bra had been cut apart and her mouth taped. Marks on her wrists indicated she had been tied up. I doubt anyone shared that with the cardinal either.

Back to Shirley Leitch. She had two thoughts in mind when she called me: Thompson doesn’t deserve to die because executions are wrong, and would I say something fair about her son David.

“I’m just a mother trying to protect my cub,” she said.

I asked if she could see the paradox of her call: She’s trying to save the man whose version of events points to her own son as the killer.

“I know,” Shirley Leitch said. “But I got over my anger at Tommy Thompson a long time ago.”

So now she and Cardinal Mahony are on the same side, even though they got there by different avenues. Maybe it’s just that Cardinal Mahony is such a strong death penalty opponent that he would buy into almost any argument that Thompson’s lawyers offered.

I started out saying the cardinal did make some good points. And here is one: The death penalty only perpetuates “a cycle of violence.”

One argument I saw recently in the New Yorker magazine comes from Manhattan Dist. Atty. Robert Morgenthau, who has yet to file a death penalty case. He calls the death penalty “a mirage that distracts society from more fruitful, less facile answers to crime.”

Adieu, Ben: Golf legend Ben Hogan said something once that has stayed with me ever since. He told an interviewer that any time he knew he was going to play golf that day--or be on a golf course for any reason--the mere thought of it made him feel good about that day. He captured me perfectly.

Hogan died Friday at the age of 84. When I heard that, I went back through The Times’ files to read all the Jim Murray columns over the last 10 years that mentioned Hogan’s name. Among the stories he tells, this was my favorite line: “Sam Snead once said there were only two things he feared on a golf course--lightning and Ben Hogan.”

The Milky Way: I’m a great believer that you can’t hug your kids enough, though it’s easy to forget in the early mornings before the caffeine kicks in. The Children’s Bureau of Southern California has a new campaign--with help from Alta Dena Dairy--to remind us of our priorities.

“Got hugs?” is the slogan now on Alta Dena milk cartons. This message from the Children’s Bureau is added underneath it: “Like a glass of milk, hugging your kids is a great way to start each day.”

Wrap-Up: Shirley Leitch told me that with the latest notoriety about the Thompson case, David Leitch has had fellow inmates coming up seeking his autograph. “I don’t know whether to laugh or cry about that one,” she said. A sad commentary, indeed.

I can’t give Shirley Leitch what she wants. Guilty people act guilty. When Leitch helped bury the body, he buried himself with the jury he eventually had to face.

But whatever Leitch’s role, you can admire his family for hiring an attorney to help him 16 years after he was first incarcerated--and after all his court-appointed attorneys have moved on to other business. A mother protecting her cub is a wondrous thing.

Jerry Hicks’ column appears Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Readers may reach Hicks by call-ing The Times Orange County Edition at (714) 966-7823 or by fax at (714) 966-7711 or by e-mail at jerry.hicks@latimes.com.