SACRAMENTO, Jan. 30 (UPI) -- California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger Friday denied clemency to Kevin Cooper, a convicted multiple killer scheduled to be executed at San Quentin next month.
Schwarzenegger said in a statement that he found no compelling reason to block Cooper's Feb. 10 execution for the 1983 hatchet murders of four people, two of them children, in a Chino Hills home.
Cooper's case has included allegations that San Bernardino County police tampered with evidence, but Schwarzenegger said there was no evidence to back up the assertion, and he noted that recent DNA tests placed Cooper at the bloody crime scene.
If the death sentence is carried out as scheduled, Cooper would be the 11th California inmate executed since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976.
