Freeman May - Recipient of Mercy Not Shown To His Victims

The time spent on death row in the USA usually stretches for decades, and it is becoming common for condemned killers to be shown mercy.  Something that their victims never received.  Another one of these killers is Freeman William May.  Now 56 and having spent 23 years on death row, the reason for the commutation of his sentence to life without parole, is that he has mental incompetency.  His crime was that in December 1982, he brutally attacked two teenage girls from the town of Lititz in Pennsylvania.  He raped one of the girls and then proceeded to stab both of them.  He left them for dead but he did not achieve his aim.  They survived the attack in woods, were able to stagger for help and were able to identify him.  He was jailed for 35 years.  But cops noted the similarities in another case that happened three months before, in September 1982.  This was the abduction and murder by stabbing of Kathy Lynn Fair.  She was on an errand in the town of Lancaster when the waitress disappeared.  She was found buried in woodland in 1988.  May was convicted and sentenced to death in 1991.  The penalty phase was retried twice in 1995 & 2008, both condemning him to death.

     The phrase "like father, like son" most definitely applies to May & his son Landon.  He has been sent to death row for the torture and murder of Terry & Lucy Smith.  This occurred in September 2001 in their Ephrata home. These were the adopted parents of Scott Bourgeois, a friend.  But what was their despicable crime that warranted their horrific deaths?  It was because they objected to the girlfriend of Scott, Drena Rodriguez.  It was she who hatched the murders.  Over some hours, they were tortured to give bank details, stabbed more than 200 times with a barbeque fork.  If that was not enough, they were attacked with hammers and then shot.  Mrs Smith was threatened into performing a sex act on May, before he and his buddy bravely picked up a TV set and dropped it on her head as she lay severely injured.  Then they suffocated her.  But there was no escape for them.  All were arrested by Police, and Bourgeois and Rodriguez pleaded guilty in order to avoid a death sentence.  They will leave prison feet first in a box.  May was convicted and condemned.