Jury Urges Death Sentence For Ex-Officer

A former New Orleans policeman who ordered a woman murdered the day after she filed a brutality complaint against him should be executed, a jury ruled Friday.

In reaching the verdict, jurors agreed that Len Davis, 31, used his position as a policeman to arrange the killing.

Kim Groves, a 32-year-old mother of three, was gunned down in front of her house in October 1994, the day after filing a complaint accusing Davis of pistol-whipping a teenager.

Davis is the first person ever sentenced to death in a civil rights case, according to Dave Bruck of the Federal Death Penalty Resource Counsel Project.

Davis and triggerman Paul Hardy, 28, were convicted Wednesday of conspiracy, civil rights violations and the premeditated killing of a federal witness. The jury will begin a sentencing hearing Monday for Hardy.