DECISION CREATES DEATH-PENALTY MUDDLE

Let's say it up front: It was a nice thing to do.

Pope John Paul II's visit to Missouri was a big deal. It marks his only visit to America this year and his first to St. Louis since becoming pope.

You can't blame Gov. Mel Carnahan for lending a sympathetic ear when the pope personally asked the state to spare the life of Darrell Mease, a death-row inmate. The pope has been devoutly outspoken on his stance against the death penalty and abortion.

But sympathy should have been the end of it. The governor went beyond the bounds of good sense when he commuted a three-time killer's sentence to life and then publicly supported the death penalty.

It wasn't a fair thing to do.

Why did this killer deserve to live? He had viciously murdered his drug partner, his partner's wife and their paraplegic grandchild. Some have said Mease's crimes make him the poster boy for the death penalty in Missouri. A jury and judge put Mease in jail after hearing compelling evidence. State and local appeals were turned down.

Let's take a closer look at the facts: Mease and his partner were methamphetamine dealers. In May 1988, Mease donned camouflage clothing and armed himself with a 12-gauge shotgun, a .357 Magnum revolver and a hunting knife and set out to kill his drug partner.

What kind of message does commuting his death sentence send to methamphetamine dealers across the state? Missouri is tough on drugs, except when the pope intervenes?

Asking a governor's pardon is commonplace. Getting one is unlikely. The governor has allowed 26 executions, commuting the sentence of only one inmate. In that case, the jury had not been told that the man was mentally retarded. At least some consideration was given to the merits of that case before the governor acted.

But Carnahan has admitted that there was no case made by the pope on behalf of Mease. Carnahan said everyone understood that this was a heinous crime.

Let's be honest. The only reason Mease received consideration was timing. His execution was originally scheduled during the Pope's two-day visit. Although the Missouri Supreme Court didn't say, the execution was likely delayed as a consideration to the pope's stance on the death penalty. It was a nice gesture, which should have ended matters.

What if the person scheduled to die had been Jerome Mallett, convicted killer of Highway Patrolman James Froemsdorf of Perryville? Mallett has been on death row for 14 years. His final appeals will probably run their course this summer, and an execution date will be set.

Since the merits didn't matter, would Carnahan have pardoned Mallett if the pope had asked? If the answer is no, then the governor shouldn't have commuted Mease's sentence to life.

Once before the pope asked Carnahan to pardon a killer. In 1991, he asked Missouri to reduce the sentence of Glennon P. Sweet for killing a state trooper in 1987. Carnahan reviewed the case but declined to intervene. Granted, that case didn't involve a face-to-face talk with the Pope, but Carnahan should have followed his earlier own good advice.

The pope has other strong views too. Why would the governor let a three-time killer live but turn a deaf ear to abortions? It makes far more sense to save innocent babies than vicious killers. Where's the justice?

Missouri's more than 80 death-row inmates know they can't expect similar treatment. The state hasn't changed its stance on the death penalty. The Supreme Court has already scheduled another execution Feb. 24. James Edward Rodden is slated to die by lethal injection for the 1983 stabbing death of a Marshall woman.

Mease's family say the commuted sentence is nothing short of a miracle. It just may be.

But it leaves Carnahan and the state in a bit of a muddle when it comes to serious crimes and the death penalty.