From the Associated Press:
HUNTSVILLE — The Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles has turned down a
clemency petition from a Dallas man set to die this week for fatally
shooting his two young daughters nearly 15 years ago.
Board spokesman Raymond Estrada says the board voted 7-0 Monday,
refusing to recommend that John David Battaglia’s death sentence be
commuted to life in prison and denying his request for a reprieve from
his scheduled Wednesday evening execution in Huntsville.
Battaglia, 60, was convicted and condemned for the May 2001 slayings
of his daughters, 9-year-old Faith and 6-year-old Liberty, at his Dallas
apartment. The girls’ mother, Battaglia’s ex-wife, was on the phone
with him and heard the gunshots and cry of the older daughter.
Battaglia still has appeals in the federal courts seeking to block his punishment.
