DEATH PENALTY, GARY ROLL CASE TO BE EXAMINED IN ARTICLES SUNDAY

On Aug. 9, 1992, Gary Lee Roll murdered Sherry Scheper and her son Randy Scheper in their Cape Girardeau home. Curtis Sheper also was killed, but Roll was not found guilty in his death.

Wednesday, eight years after the murders took place, Roll is scheduled to die by lethal injection for his crimes.

Barring a last-minute stay, Roll, 48, will be the 44th person executed in Missouri since the state resumed carrying out the death penalty in 1989. He also will be the first from Cape Girardeau County since that time.

On Sunday, the Southeast Missourian will publish an in-depth series of articles examining the Roll case and issues surrounding the death penalty in Missouri.

Included will be interviews with a police investigator involved in the case, the prosecutor who sent Roll to death row and the defense attorney who tried to keep him off of it, as well as death penalty opponents and those who knew Roll prior to the crime.

The Southeast Missourian on Tuesday will publish articles based on an interview with a relative of Roll's victims and one of his accomplices. Reports on his execution, should it be carried out, will be published in Wednesday's and Thursday's editions.