Posted on 05/03/2007 4:25:11 PM PDT by buccaneer81
A death row Republican The condemned man says he supports public executions By Dan Williamson / May 3, 2007
Christopher J. Newton murdered his cellmate because he kept surrendering during chess games.
The convicted murderer who’s next on Ohio’s execution list didn’t sound particularly remorseful about killing his cellmate in cold blood, but he said this week he deserves to die.
Christopher J. Newton was surprisingly candid in his conversation Monday with Dayton Daily News reporter Laura Bischoff, who interviewed Newton on behalf of the Ohio Legislative Correspondents Association.
In addition to explaining why he murdered his cellmate at the Mansfield Correctional Institution in 2001 over a chess game, Newton spoke of his support for capital punishment and his opposition to the Cleveland Browns’ decision to draft Brady Quinn.
Newton, a 37-year-old from Erie County, described himself as a “Republican on death row.”
“I’m for the death penalty. If you’re sentenced to it, they should carry it out,” he told Bischoff.
“Matter of fact, when I talked to the state troopers who were investigating after the fact, I told them, ‘I’m not going to cooperate with you unless you get it to the prosecutor that I want the death penalty.’”
Newton killed Jason Brewer, 27, after they’d been cellmates for about a month. Newton punched Brewer in the face, tied a piece of rope around his neck and shoved a gag down his throat. He then strangled Brewer with a piece of cloth.
Newton was matter-of-fact in describing the reasons for his crime.
“I don’t mean to laugh or anything,” he said with a chuckle as he recalled the fateful chess game.
“But it’s stupid when you look back on it. He kept giving up. Every time I put him in check, he’d give up and want to start a new game. And I tried to tell him you never give up. You never know when your opponent is going to make a mistake. So you play it out until you can’t play it out any more. I just got tired of it.”
After he hit Brewer, Newton determined he had to kill him.
“The problem is,” Newton said, “once you put your hands on somebody here, no matter how small or how big they are, when you’re locked in a cell with them 23 hours a day, if you go to sleep, they can be the biggest, baddest person in the world and you’ll just not wake up, you know. I’m not saying that would’ve happened, but you never know.”
Asked whether he had any remorse, Newton said, “I feel regret because I caused his family pain, but I don’t regret the act that I did.”
Newton described himself as a person in need of structure who engaged in petty crime from the time he was about 10 years old. After being released from prison in 1999 after a seven-year burglary charge, he had trouble adapting to the outside world. When his parole officer refused to send him back in, he committed another burglary. If not for Brewer’s murder, he would have been released this July.
Despite his wish to return to prison, Newton said he’s glad he won’t be spending 40 or so more years there.
“You don’t want to spend your life in a hell hole,” he said. “Nothing against the prison system, but it’s not the funnest place to be.”
A Browns fan, Newton said he disapproved of Cleveland’s decision to trade future draft picks to select Brady Quinn with the 22nd choice Saturday.
“They messed up the picks,” he said. “Offensive line, not quarterback: If they get an offensive line, they’ll start producing. They didn’t need to trade picks for Quinn. Start at your center and work out. Get people to protect your quarterback.”
Newton laughingly recalled that Ohio’s last executed prisoner, James Filiaggi, made a joke about the Browns in his final statement before he was killed April 24.
“Filiaggi made a comment the other day before he went that if the Browns win a Super Bowl, he’s in hell,” Newton said. “Well, Browns win a Super Bowl, I’ll be in heaven.” Return to site top
© 2007 The Other Paper and CM Media Inc., Columbus, Ohio.
i love that they’ve got this guy discussing draft picks, as if his opinion matters?? the press.... what a bunch of idiots.
I think Bobby Fischer could be that deranged.
“Christopher J. Newton murdered his cellmate because he kept surrendering during chess games.”
France... Meet Germany.
*Growls and snivelly whimpering heard over background music*
More accurately, it appears that he decided once he had struck his cellmate he had to "massively escalate" the situation or become the victim himself.
This guy would also have killed his cellmate if the cellmate had beaten him at chess.
Another reason convicted murderers should always be executed, the sooner, the better.
So then, what? You stand there at a standstill looking at each other like those two characters from that Dr. Suess short?
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