New Hampshire: ATM cards were motive in professors’ slayings

The teens accused of butchering two Dartmouth College professors talked their way into the couple’s home by claiming to be doing a survey and killed them in a plot to steal their ATM cards, prosecutors charged Tuesday.

The allegations  contained in a newly unsealed indictment  mark the first time authorities have given a detailed motive for the slayings last year of Half Zantop and his wife, Susanne.

In the six months leading up the killings, Robert Tulloch and James Parker had gone to four other randomly chosen homes, intending to kill the occupants for their ATM cards, but no one was home or the people who answered the door would not let them in, according to the indictment.

Tulloch, 18, has indicated he will use an insanity defense at his murder trial, which is scheduled to start in April.

Parker, 17, has pleaded guilty to reduced charges and agreed to testify against Tulloch. The indictment does not say whether the newly released details came from Parker.

Alabama : Slashing victim escapes after being buried alive

A man whose throat was slashed and who was buried in a shallow grave with his slain 12-year-old son clawed his way out of the dirt and helped police find two men accused of killing the boy.

Forrest “Butch” Bowyer, 54, underwent surgery and was expected to recover, Sheriff Tommy Boswell said Tuesday in Phenix City.

The suspects, Michael David Carruth, 43, and Jimmy Lee Brooks Jr., 22, were charged with capital murder, attempted murder, robbery and kidnapping. They were being held without bail.

The sheriff said Brooks and Carruth, who works as a bounty hunter, showed up at Bowyer’s home late Sunday claiming to be narcotics officers. They targeted Bowyer because he owns a used-car lot and has a reputation for carrying lots of cash, the sheriff said.

Ohio : Inmate’s execution not by preferred means

Convicted killer John W. Byrd Jr., who once chose the electric chair for his death to make a statement against capital punishment, was executed by injection on Tuesday in Lucasville after a federal appeals court refused to grant a stay.

Byrd, 38, was sentenced to die for the 1983 murder of Monte Tewksbury, 40, who was stabbed during a robbery at a convenience store outside Cincinnati where he was moonlighting to pay for his daughter’s education.

Byrd maintained he was innocent of the murder. An accomplice, John Brewer, confessed to stabbing Tewksbury, but prosecutors argued that since Brewer already was serving a life sentence and could not be tried again, he was lying to protect Byrd.

Gov. Bob Taft signed a bill in November that banned the use of the electric chair, and last week he denied Byrd clemency.

Boston: Governor upholds child abuse sentence

Acting Gov. Jane Swift has refused to commute the sentence of a man convicted in 1986 of molesting and raping eight children at a family run day-care center.

Gerald Amirault has served 15 years of a 30- to 40-year sentence. Last month, the parole board recommended by a 5-0 vote commutation of his sentence, saying there is “substantial doubt” about his conviction.

Swift made her decision after her legal team interviewed more than 35 people on both sides, her spokesman Jim Borghesani said Tuesday.

“It brought back memories that upset me, but I’m happy. He’s where he should be,” said Barbara Standke, 47.

Standke said her son was one of the victims of abuse at the Fells Acres Day School in Malden.