Houston Chronicle

Friday, February 25, 2000

Great-grandmother executed for 1983 slaying Bush denies 30-day stay

By JOHN WILLIAMS and KATHY WALT

HUNTSVILLE -- Betty Lou Beets, a 62-year-old great-grandmother of six, became Thursday the second woman executed in Texas since the Civil War.

Beets was only the fourth woman executed in the United States since the Supreme Court allowed the death penalty to resume in 1976.

She was put to death for the 1983 murder of Dallas firefighter Jimmy Don Beets, her fifth husband. She also was indicted but never tried for the murder of her fourth husband, Doyle Wayne Barker. And she was convicted of shooting her second husband, Bill Lane.

Although she denied being the killer during her 1985 trial, Beets recently claimed she had been driven to kill by years of physical and psychological abuse.

Beets said nothing Thursday as she lay strapped to the death chamber gurney. She made no eye contact with the victims' families who witnessed the execution but smiled at her own family.

The flow of three lethal drugs began at 6:08 p.m. Beets continued to smile as she slipped into unconsciousness and she was pronounced dead at 6:18 p.m.

Members of the families of Jimmy Don Beets and Barker joined hands as they watched Beets die.

As they filed out of the death chamber at the Walls Unit, Doyle Barker's son, Rodney, pumped his right fist into the air.

"I want the world to know that there is always going to be a death penalty in Texas," Rodney Barker said. "We need to use it. The state of Texas did the right thing tonight by putting Betty Lou Beets to death."

James Beets, son of Jimmy Don Beets, said, "Today, we need to make a statement to stop all this murder. We need to get the Lord back into the peoples' hearts and to quit this killing of kids, grown ups, of murder period."

The Beets case captured the attention of the nation this past week because it is unusual for a woman to be executed and because Gov. George W. Bush is in the midst of a hard-fought political campaign with Arizona Sen. John McCain for the Republican presidential nomination.

Death penalty opponents called upon Bush to put his campaign platform of "compassionate conservatism" into action and grant Beets a 30-day stay of execution so her claims of spousal abuse could be investigated. The governor's office received 2,108 telephone calls and letters opposing Beets' execution by Thursday afternoon, and 57 calls and letters supporting it.

Bush, however, declined to postpone the execution and released a brief, tersely worded statement that read in part: "After careful review of the evidence in the case I concur with the jury that Betty Lou Beets is guilty of this murder," and he was "confident that the courts, both state and federal, have thoroughly reviewed all the issues raised by the defendant."

About 100 people gathered outside the prison walls Thursday night to protest Beets' execution. Many carried signs. One read, "Don't kill Bettie (sic) Beets. What my husbands started, Texas will finish." Another had a picture of a much younger Beets gazing up and to the right with a large bruise on her left jaw. Her supporters called it evidence of spousal abuse.

Beets' attorney, Joe Margulies, took her case to federal appeals court and the U.S. Supreme Court on Thursday but could not get a delay. Margulies reacted harshly after Beets' was put to death.

"This was not an act of compassion, it is an act of cowardice," he said. "Murder is an act of cowardice."

Not everyone outside the prison was opposed to Beets' execution. Three friends of son James Beets stood among death penalty protestors and praised the proceedings

"People forget about the victims and Jimmy Don Beets was the victim," said Terry Heath, a life-long friend of James Beets. "This woman is getting exactly what she deserves."

Thursday night's crowd was a tenth of the size of the one that gathered on Feb. 3, 1998, when Karla Faye Tucker was executed for the pick ax murder of two people.

Chipita Rodriguez was the only other woman to be executed in Texas. She was hanged in 1863 for the ax murder of a horse trader.

Beets was the ninth inmate executed in Texas this year.

Prosecutors said Beets shot Jimmy Don Beets to death to collect his $110,000 pension and life insurance package. Jimmy Don Beets had been reported missing and presumed drowned after a fishing trip in 1983. An anonymous tip in 1985 led police to his body and the body of Barker, buried in the yard of Beets' mobile home in Gun Barrel City, located in Henderson County in East Texas.

Beets was a mother of five, grandmother of nine and a great-grandmother of six.

Beets spoke with the prison chaplain Thursday but she made no special requests and declined to make a final statement.

"To describe her mood, it was solemn, rather subdued, quiet," said Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokesman Larry Todd.

The Associated Press contributed to this story.