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150 people sign letter opposing Missouri man's execution, including jurors and Republican reps

Katie Moore, The Kansas City Star on

Published in News & Features

KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Jurors, corrections officers and Republican state representatives have signed onto a request asking Missouri Gov. Mike Parson to grant clemency to a man facing execution next month.

Brian Dorsey, 51, was convicted in the 2006 killing of his cousin Sarah Bonnie and her husband Ben Bonnie in central Missouri.

The state of Missouri will execute Dorsey on April 9 unless a court halts the lethal injection or Parson steps in. Parson has denied every capital clemency request during his tenure as governor, including four last year.

Johnathan Shiflett, a spokesman for Parson’s office, said Wednesday that the governor and his legal team are in the process of reviewing the clemency application. Once Parson has made a decision, an announcement will be released prior to the scheduled execution date.

An application submitted to his office includes more than 150 signatories to letters supporting the commutation of Dorsey’s sentence to life without parole.

Five jurors who were part of the sentencing phase say Dorsey should be granted clemency.

 

“By the grace of God, I hope you will find your way to give him a life sentence instead of death,” one of them wrote in a letter to Parson.

More than 70 corrections employees who support Dorsey note that he has not had any conduct violations in prison and has served as the trusted barber at Potosi Correctional Center, where he cuts hair for both staff and prisoners.

According to the clemency application, Republican state representatives Tony Lovasco, of O’Fallon, Jeff Coleman, of Grain Valley, and Adam Schwadron, of St. Charles, said Dorsey “is uniquely deserving of our mercy and should not be executed.”

Dozens of Dorsey’s friends and family oppose his execution. Some were related to Sarah Bonnie, one of the victims. They said Dorsey struggled throughout his life with severe depression, which led him to addiction at an early age.

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