NATION - news items

National Catholic Reporter, July 16, 1999 by Matt Kantz

The letter had no effect, however, in delaying the scheduled executions of two killers, Thomas Provenzano and Allen Lee Davis. Bush spokesperson Cory Tilley said the governor "takes very seriously the contents of the letter, but he takes just as seriously signing death warrants in cases that involve abhorrent crimes like these."

Davis was executed by electric chair July 8 for the 1982 shooting and beating deaths of a pregnant mother and her two young daughters. Blood poured from Davis' mouth and oozed from his chest as he was hit with 2,300 volts. There was no immediate explanation for the bleeding.

New York lawyer Marty McClain, who represented Davis, had challenged the execution because of Davis' weight, which was 350 pounds. McClain said Florida's electric chair did not have sufficient voltage to carry out the execution quickly and painlessly.

After Provenzano killed an Orlando courthouse bailiff, security measures were instituted in all Florida courthouses. At press time, the Florida Supreme Court had granted a 48-hour stay to Provenzano so that a Bradford County circuit judge could determine if the inmate is schizophrenic. Three court-appointed psychiatrists declared him sane, clearing the way for his execution, expected to be carried out July 9.

--Judy Gross

Priest chafed with smuggling counterfeit money

A Catholic priest from the Philippines was released in Brooklyn, N.Y., June 24 after being charged with trying to smuggle amateurish counterfeit Treasury notes with a purported value of $2.4 billion on a flight from South Korea.

Fr. Mario Beato-Prieto was released from a Brooklyn federal court after four

fellow Augustinian priests from a Manhattan church signed a $25,000 bail bond. Beato-Prieto pleaded innocent to a charge of foreign transport of false documents.

Beato-Prieto, 35, a Spanish national and an administrator at a Manila parochial school, was arrested at Kennedy Airport June 22 after U.S. Customs agents found phony notes in his luggage.

U.S Magistrate Cheryl Pollak placed Beato-Prieto under church arrest, confined to the rectory and the chapel when not in court. The judge heeded the priests' request that Beato-Prieto could help say Mass.

Prosecutors allege Beato-Prieto was plotting to sell 24 phony notes through a broker. He also had $2,000 in real cash, plus a document indicating he had access to another $65 million in bogus bonds.