■ _._
Sports
■ Clester Johnson now No. 3 quarterback, page 7
Arts and Entertainment
■ Paintball war rages on In Lincoln, page 9
PAGE 2: Fire guts Gresham grain elevator office
i
COVERING THE UNIVERSITY OF NEBRASKA SINCE 1901 VOL. 94 NO. 36
Special prosecutor to probe Renteria death
By Brian Sharp
Senior Reporter
Lancaster County Attorney Gary
Lacey requested Tuesday that a spe
cial prosecutor be appointed to inves
tigate the death of Francisco Renteria.
Renteria, 29, had a confrontation
with police on Sept. 30. Following
the confrontation, he had a seizure
and went into a coma. He died Oct. 1.
The request for a special prosecu
tor is being considered by Lancaster
County District Judge Donald
Endacott.
Lacey said he requested the inde
pendent prosecutor because too many
people were questioning his office's
objcctivcncss in prosecuting the case.
Many of the complaints were targeted
at his association with Lincoln and
university police, Lacey said.
“If there are those who are going to
say at the end of the investigation that
I could not be fair... then I don't think
that the public good will be served.”
he said.
Charges of bias in the county
attorney’s office are unfounded, he
said. But Lacey said he was obligated
to make sure the public had confi
dence in the judicial process.
Endacott, presiding judge of dis
trict court, received Lacey’s request
early Tuesday morning. Endacott said
he met with four other district judges
Tuesday and will meet again today att
8 a.m. The judges will determine who»
the prosecutor will be, Endacott said.
Endacott said it was unusual to
have five judges help select the pros
ecutor, but that the case deserved
special attention. A Lincoln attorney
will be selected for the job, he said.
Although the judges had some candi
dates in mind, Endacott declined to
release their names.
Lacey said Tuesday he would not
release the report on Renteria's au
topsy, but would leave that action to
the special prosecutor.
“I become someone in left field,”
Lacey said.
Parts of the autopsy still are in
complete, he said.
Lacey said Renteria’s death cer
tificate had not been signed because
the medical cause and manner of death
had not been determined. Manner of
death can be one of four things: acci
dent, homicide, suicide or natural
causes, he said.
Regardless of the autopsy and in
vestigation. Lacey said, final judge
ment about possible wrongdoing in
the case should be reserved to the 19
member grand jury.
Slate law requires that a. grand
jury hear all cases in which someone
dies while in police custody.
“It’s not going to be a public trial,”
he said. “The grand jury is secret. I
don’t see any purpose in having a
complete trial in the press.”
Lacey called a letter sent Monday
by State Sen. Ernie Chambers of
Omaha to U S. Attorney Thomas
Monaghan inappropriate. The letter
described alleged details of the Sept.
30 incident and the autopsy.
“Senator Chambers has his own
agenda,” he said. “And he’s never
been known, at least to me. to be a
paragon of fairness.”
Lacey would not comment on the
validity of Chambers’s statements.
Lincoln Police Chief Tom Casady
had a one word reaction to Chain
See PROBE on 6
Opening the closet
Shaun Sartin/DN
University of Nebraska-Uncoln students look at chalk drawings at Broyhlll Plaza Tuesday afternoon during an
open-microphone session about homosexuality.
UNL homosexuals celebrate identities
By Paula Lavlgno_
Senior Reporter
Thomas Caramagno stepped up to a mi
crophone in front of the Nebraska Union on
Tuesday.
Amid cheers and applause, the Univer
sity of Ncbraska-Lincoln associate English
professor introduced himself and said. “I’m
a bisexual."
Gay, lesbian and bisexual students and
faculty members at UNL celebrated Na
tional Coming Out Day on Tuesday.
Students and faculty members read in
formational pamphletsand shared their com
ing-out stories.
The open microphone was sponsored by
members of the UNL Gay/Lesbian Student
Association, who spoke to people passing
the union and invited any gays, lesbians or
bisexuals still “in the closet" to come to the
microphone and reveal their sexuality.
Caramagno read from a letter he wrote to
the Daily Nebraskan in response to a col
umn chastising homosexuality in Tuesday's
newspaper.
As he spoke, people walked and glanced
at chalk messages on the sidewalk that said.
“Do you know where the nearest bisexual
is? — Look over your shoulder" and “God
loves me just as I am.”
Caramagno said the prejudice against
homosexuals and bisexuals was similar to
the hatred shown toward the Jews in Nazi
Germany.
The Nazis said Jews were carriers of
disease, he said. Gay bashers make similar
accusations against homosexuals.
“The stigmata of disease is a favorite tool
of fascists everywhere,” he said.
Caramagno referred to the U.S. Consti
tution. saying the rights of life, liberty and
the pursuit of happiness were inalienable.
“When one group’s rights can be re
voked,” he said, “all of our rights are in
danger.”
During the speeches, members of the gay
and lesbian group passed out pink triangles
— a symbol of acceptance — to students
sitting near Broyhill Fountain.
Meanwhile, members of Victory Fellow
ship Church passed out sheets of pink paper
that condemned sodomy and cited passages
from the Bible.
Rev. Mike Wooten said he wanted people
to know “what God says about sodomy and
sin."
“I want to warn them of the conse
quences.” he said, “and the consequence of
sin is death.”
The speakers have the right to voice their
opinions, Wooten said, but opinions don’t
matter.
“Homosexuality is a sin,” he said. “God
will judge sin.
“Sinners don’t have to remain homo
sexuals. Jesus can make a man out of a
homosexual, and he can make a woman out
of a lesbian.”
Scott Roewer, a senior music education
major and a member of the Gay/Lcsbian
Student Association, took some of the
church's pink warnings and tore them into
shreds.
Roewer also told his coming-out story.
He said his mother knew he was “different”
since he was 9 years old. but his father
struggled with the news.
“My dad took it really hard. He expected
me to carry on the bloodline,” he said.
Chris Pavao, president of the Gay/Les
bian Student Association, also told his com
ing-out story. He said he revealed his sexu
ality to his mother in the parking lot of a
department store.
“She went numb. She cried,” he said. ”...
I told her the house, picket fence and all that
stuff can happen, but not with a woman.”
Pavao, a senior English major, said
Tuesday’s event honored the first gay and
lesbian march on Washington, D.C., that
occurred on Oct. 11, 1987.
“We’re promoting visibility,” he said.
See DAY on 3
Joubert s
sentence
overturned
By Matthew Walto __
Senior Reporter
A U.S. District Court judge overturned on
Tuesday the death sentence of John Joubcrt,
convicted in 1984 for the kidnapping and mur
der of two Nebraska boys.
In an 132-page decision. Judge William
Cambridge said arguments used to determine
Joubert’s sentence were unconstitutionally
vague. He ordered the state to rcsentence Joubert
within the next 60 days.
Joubert, 31. was sentenced on Oct. 9. 1984,
for the 1983 murders of Danny Joe Ebcrle, 13,
and Christopher Paul Walden, 12, both of
Sarpy County.
The two boys were abducted in Bellevue,
where Joubcrt had been stationed at Offutt Air
Force Base. Ebcrle disappeared on Sept. 18.
1983, and Walden disappeared on Dec. 2.
1983.
Joubert later was convicted of the 1982
murder of a third boy in Maine.
Attorney General Don Stenberg said Ne
braskans would be “justifiably angry” with
Cambridge's decision.
John Joubert confessed ana pleaded guilty
to brutally murdering two young boys in Ne
braska,” Stenberg read from a prepared state
ment. “John Joubert deserves the death pen
alty, and I intend to vigorously pursue this case
until the sentence is carried out.”
In overturning Joubcrt’s sentence, Cam
bridge pointed to a 1991 decision by the 8th
U S. Circuit Court of Appeals in the case of
Carey Dean Moore.
The appellate court ordered the state to
rcsentence Moore, who originally was sen
tenced to death for the 1979 killings of two
Omaha taxi drivers. In the case, the appeals
court said the term “exceptional depravity”
was vague.
Judges who sentenced Joubert cited “excep
tional depravity” as an aggravating circum
stance that helped them decide on the death
penalty."
The Joubert case, he said, was different from
the Moore case, because in the Moore case, the
state used only one of several circumstances
that warrant the death penalty.
Stenberg said Joubert s crimes were not
only exceptionally depraved but also excep
tionally heinous, atrocious and cruel, which is
another circumstance that warrants the death
penalty.
J. Kirk Brown, the state’s attorney in capital
cases, said the term “exceptionally heinous,
atrocious and cruel” had been tested in federal
court and upheld.
Mark Weber, Joubcrt’s attorney, said the
state’s decision to appeal didn’t surprise him.
He said he had talked to Joubert Tuesday about
the decision.
“We were pleased with the decision to over-,
turn the death penalty,” Weber said.
The Associated Press contributed to this report
