12-year death row inmate to be executed

Wednesday, February 9th 2000, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

OKLAHOMA CITY (AP) -- A man who confessed to stabbing his elderly Oklahoma City neighbor after he claimed she told him to "finish the job" is scheduled to die by lethal injection early Thursday. Michael Donald Roberts has been on death row for 12 years since being convicted for the murder of 80-year-old Lula Mae Brooks on Jan. 16, 1988.

The state attorney general's office expects the execution to proceed as scheduled. The state Court of Criminal Appeals Tuesday denied Roberts' motion for a new hearing and a stay of execution. "We don't expect any obstacles to the execution," spokesman Gerald Adams said Tuesday.

A detective who worked the case has indicated he may attend the execution, Adams said. None of Brooks' family is expected. Three people may witness the execution for Roberts, said C.L Mason, a spokesman for the Oklahoma State Penitentiary in McAlester.

For a last meal, Roberts requested three pounds of barbecued beef ribs, six dinner rolls, one Cornish hen, one cheeseburger, a 7-Up and a strawberry drink.

Roberts was accused of a series of robberies of elderly residents in northwest Oklahoma City in late 1987 and early 1988. Brooks lived three houses away from him. Roberts was charged with murdering Brooks during a burglary of her home. Brooks was stabbed in the head and neck. Her throat was also slit.

In a police confession, Robert had said he saw the door open to Brooks' house and went inside. He claimed he stabbed Brooks when she came at him with a knife. He said he cut her throat with another knife when she charged him a second time. Roberts said he tossed Brooks on the floor. He said she then asked him to "finish the job, finish the job."

Police and prosecutors said Brooks had lost too much blood to speak and that Roberts killed Brooks because she could identify him. During his trial, Roberts recanted his earlier confession, which included an admission to 19 other robberies. He told jurors he confessed because detectives offered him a 15-year sentence to clear up the killing and robberies. Detectives denied Roberts' claim.

At the time of his sentencing, Oklahoma County District Judge James B. Blevins said, "It is my firm belief that you need not fear that you will be executed." Blevins said death penalty opponents would search until they found a way to overturn the death penalty.

Roberts would be the 105th inmate executed in Oklahoma and the 22nd in the state since the U.S. Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1977. He is among about 140 inmates on death row in Oklahoma. The state Pardon and Parole Board denied Roberts' clemency request late last month.

A March 9 execution has been set for Loyd Winford Lafevers, who was convicted of killing an 84-year-old Addie Hawley of Oklahoma City in 1985. A March 23 date is set for Kelly Lamont Rogers. Rogers was convicted in the 1990 murder of Karen Marie Lauffenburger in her Stillwater apartment.

Malcolm Rent Johnson and Gary Alan Walker have already been executed this year. Others are sure to follow, Attorney General Drew Edmondson has said. As many as 20 of Oklahoma's death row inmates probably will not live to see 2001, he said. At least that many more could be executed next year. Oklahoma executed only four inmates in 1998 and six last year. But the pace of executions is quickening as more death row inmates exhaust their appeals