USA - Oregon. The Oregon Supreme Court vacated the death penalty for Dayton Leroy Rogers, 59, white, a serial killer

The Oregon Supreme Court vacated the death penalty for Dayton Leroy Rogers, 59, white, Oregon's most prolific serial killer, sending his case back to Clackamas County Circuit Court for a 4th sentencing trial. Rogers admitted to killing six women in 1987, but he pleaded for jurors to let him live. He was first sentenced to death in 1989. In 1992 the Oregon Supreme Court overturned his death sentence, based on a U.S. Supreme Court ruling that said defendants in capital cases can offer evidence that might persuade the jury to sentence them to prison rather than death. In 1994 Rogers was sentenced a 2nd time to death. In 2000 he winned a 3rd penalty trial when the Oregon Supreme Court overturned his 1994 death sentence, saying that the judge should have let the jury consider sentencing him to life without the possibility of parole, an option that did not exist in his 1st trial. On March 7, 2006 (see) a 3rd Clackamas County trial sentenced Rogers to death. In its ruling Thursday, the Supreme Court said Clackamas County Circuit Judge Ronald D. Thom erred when he ordered certain "juror anonymity" procedures that precluded Rogers and his defense attorneys from learning the identities of potential jurors, undercutting their ability to help pick an impartial jury. The state's high court also said Thom erred when he admitted testimony during the penalty phase about a homosexual relationship Rogers had as a teenager.