From the LVRJ: A Catholic priest convicted of killing a nun inside a chapel a day before Easter 1980 died Friday at a Columbus prison hospice unit, a day after a federal judge refused his request to be released to family care so he could die in his hometown of Toledo.
Attorney Richard Kerger said the Rev. Gerald Robinson’s sister-in-law told him the priest died Friday morning.
“I’m sure he’s in a better place,” Kerger said.
Robinson, 76, had been serving a sentence of 15 years to life in what church historians have characterized as the only documented case of a Catholic priest killing a nun.
He had been in a hospice unit since the end of May after suffering a heart attack. A federal judge on Thursday refused to release him to relatives, concluding that the court didn’t have jurisdiction to grant such compassionate release.
Robinson was arrested 24 years after the nun’s death and was found guilty in 2006 of stabbing and strangling Sister Margaret Ann Pahl at a Toledo hospital where they both worked.
Robinson and Pahl had worked closely together at the hospital where he was a chaplain and she was caretaker of the chapel. He presided at the funeral Mass for her.
The 71-year-old nun was killed while she was preparing the chapel for Easter services in 1980. She was choked and then stabbed 31 times.
Robinson emerged as a suspect when police found a sword-shaped letter opener in his desk drawer two weeks after the killing. He also admitted lying to police, making up a story that someone else confessed to the murder. Yet he was not charged and remained a priest. A year after the killing, he was transferred out of the hospital....
Prosecutors said Robinson tried to humiliate Pahl in her death, her stab wounds formed an upside down cross and a smudge of blood on her forehead meant as a mock anointing.
They blamed the murder on Robinson’s simmering anger over Pahl’s domineering ways, saying their relationship was strained and that Pahl was upset over the shortening of Good Friday services a day before she was killed.
Robinson, who wore his priest’s collar throughout his trial, maintained his innocence while losing several attempts to overturn his conviction. His attorneys said DNA evidence didn’t link Robinson to the crime.http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/nation-and-world/priest-convicted-1980-killing-nun-dies-prison
So, the priest thug kills a nun by stabbing her 31 times and then choking her.
My bet is that he is in a world that is far worse than a prison cell, where he gets to watch TV, read books, pray and more.
If he does make it to heaven, over hell, it would kind of cheapen heaven, wouldn't it?
Bolton v. US, et. al.
1 hour ago
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