At an afternoon news conference, Gov

At an afternoon news conference, Gov. Pawlenty expressed his deep sorrow for Dru Sjodin. The arrest of a Minnesota sex offender in the abduction of a North Dakota college student led Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty to call for the death penalty in his state. Pawlenty said he will ask the Legislature to allow juries to impose the death penalty in cases where sexual assaults are coupled with murders or attempts to murder, where police and children are killed and in "other heinous crimes." "As a Minnesotan, as a governor, as a dad of 2 young daughters, I'm fed up. I'm fed up with these stories where we have children abducted, women abducted with a not very good system for resolving the issue," he told a news conference. "It will be an uphill battle, but I am going to push it." Minnesota is 1 of 12 states without the death penalty. It abolished capital punishment in 1906. Pawlenty, a Republican finishing his 1st year as governor, supported death penalty bills as a legislator. He has never spoken before as governor about seeking the law change. But he said the case of student Dru Sjodin, who has been missing since Nov. 22, was a tipping point. Authorities have arrested Alfonso Rodriguez Jr., 50, in the case. Rodriguez was released from a Minnesota prison in May after serving 23 years for an attempted abduction in Crookston in 1979. The most recent newspaper public opinion poll was in February 2000, where 57 % favored the death penalty for convicted murderers and 33 % opposed it. That Star Tribune poll signaled a decline in public support from a 1996 survey that found 73 % of Minnesotans favoring executions. Minnesota does provide for life without parole under certain circumstances. Congress reinstated the death penalty for certain federal crimes in 1988. Federal prosecutors in Minnesota have not asked for capital punishment in any cases brought to trial since then.