The state Senate approved a bill that would carry out the U

The state Senate approved a bill that would carry out the U.S. Supreme Court's decision exempting mentally retarded murderers from execution.
Under the bill, mentally retarded defendants no longer would be executed at San Quentin for first-degree murder with special circumstances; they would be locked behind bars for the rest of their lives with no parole.
Senate President Pro Tem John L. Burton (D-San Francisco), and Assemblywoman Dion Aroner, a liberal Democrat from Berkeley who introduced the bill (AB 557), said it was unknown how many people on California's death row might qualify as mentally retarded. But Burton said he believed it was no more than a few.
On a partisan 23-11 vote, two more than needed for approval, Democrats overwhelmed Republicans and sent the bill to the Assembly, where its outlook is murky, especially among conservative Democrats from marginal districts.
A spokesman said Gov. Gray Davis, a supporter of the death penalty, had taken no position on the bill.