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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Attorneys for condemned Utah inmate Ronnie Lee Gardner have asked the state's Board of Pardons and Parole to consider commuting his death sentence to life in prison.
Agency spokesman Jim Hatch says in a news release that the board has seven days to decide whether to hold a hearing. State law does not require the board to hold a hearing.
Gardner's attorney, Andrew Parnes, did not return messages left for him late Tuesday.
The 49-year-old Gardner is set to be executed by firing squad on June 18.
Gardner was sentenced to death in 1985 for the Salt Lake City courthouse slaying of attorney Michael Burdell during a failed escape attempt.
Parnes has sought a stay of the execution pending an appeal of the case to the Utah Supreme Court.
(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
