La. Supreme Court Rejects Derrick Todd Lee’s Appeal

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A man convicted of murdering two women and linked to five other south Louisiana slayings has lost his latest appeal in a death penalty case.

Louisiana's Supreme Court on Friday rejected Derrick Todd Lee's appeal of his conviction and death sentence in the 2002 death of LSU graduate student Charlotte Murray Pace in Baton Rouge.

Lee's arguments included a claim that the district court provided the defense too little funding for adequate DNA testing of evidence. The high court rejected that and other arguments.

Lee also was convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison in the 2002 killing of Geralyn Barr DeSoto of Addis. He also was implicated in the slaying of a woman in Lafayette, one in Zachary and three others in Baton Rouge.

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