ROLL PUT TO DEATH FOR TRIPLE MURDER

POTOSI, Mo. -- The state executed Gary Lee Roll by injection at just after 12:01 a.m. today for a 1992 triple homicide in Cape Girardeau.

Roll and his attorneys had planned no last-minute court appeals but had requested clemency from Gov. Mel Carnahan. The governor rejected that request late Tuesday.

In an interview with The Associated Press Monday, Roll said he didn't expect a stay of his execution. "I've been in constant pain for over 20 years," Roll said. "I'm not really fighting this very hard."

Roll, 48, of Cape Girardeau became the 44th Missouri inmate executed since the state resumed capital punishment in 1989 and the first in 37 years to be put to death for a crime committed in Southeast Missouri.

On Aug. 9, 1992, Roll and two accomplices -- all intoxicated on alcohol, marijuana and LSD -- set out to steal money and drugs. The robbery, which netted them $214 and 12 sandwich bags of marijuana, ended with the murders of Sherry Scheper, 47, and her two sons, Randy, 17, and Curtis, 22, in their home at 31 N. Henderson St.

Roll pleaded guilty to all three murders on Aug. 30, 1993 -- seven years to the day before he was executed -- in Boone County Circuit Court, where his trial was moved on a change of venue.

The two accomplices, John G. Browne Jr., now 29, and David Rhodes, 26, both are serving life sentences at the Farmington Correctional Center for their part in the crimes.

Ron Scheper of Cape Girardeau, the father of Curtis and Randy and ex-husband of Sherry, planned to witness Roll's execution at the Potosi Correctional Center.

"I hope I'll get the closure I'm looking for," Scheper previously told the Southeast Missourian.

Tammy Scheper, the daughter of Ron and Sherry and sister to Curtis and Randy, did not plan to attend nor did her brother, Ron Scheper Jr., 37, of St. Louis.

Tammy Scheper, 35, of Lynchburg, Va., said in a telephone interview Tuesday that she decided not to witness the execution because she was afraid how she might react. At first she thought she had a responsibility to her family to do so but now believes she must look after her own mental health. She said she has made great strides toward putting the death of her mother and brothers behind her.

"I don't want to be part of all the attention and hearing 'poor Gary,'" Scheper said.

She said it made no difference to her whether Roll was executed or simply remained in prison for life. She just wanted a final decision.

Roll's clemency request cited that his use of illegal drugs stemmed from a botched oral surgery he underwent in 1973 while in the Army. The surgery left Roll in chronic pain and led to a long addiction to pain killers and later, his attorneys have maintained, to illegal drugs. The clemency petition also claimed Roll received inadequate legal representation at trial.

Prior to Roll, Sammy Aire Tucker was the last man executed for a Southeast Missouri crime. Tucker was executed by gas on July 26, 1963, for the murders of Cape Girardeau police Lt. Donald Crittendon and auxiliary Officer Herbert Gross.

Tony Hall of the Southeast Missourian contributed to this report.

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