Clemency sought for convicted murderer

HELENA – A Poplar man has been in prison for more than two decades for a murder he didn’t commit, claims a New Jersey group that is asking Montana’s governor to grant clemency.

Centurion Ministries argues that former Gov. Marc Racicot – then the state’s special prosecutor in the attorney general’s office – was guilty of misconduct in the 1984 trial of Barry Beach.

Racicot told Montana’s Lee Newspapers in a story Saturday that the case has been appealed to numerous courts, which have always upheld the conviction.

Sarah Elliott, a spokeswoman for Gov. Brian Schweitzer, said the governor’s office received the group’s application for clemency last week. The governor’s office will review it, she said, but has not yet had enough time to do so.

Beach has been behind bars in Montana since 1984 when a jury found him guilty of killing 17-year-old Kimberly Nees.

Beach was not questioned about the crime until five years after Nees’ death, according to Centurion’s investigation. He was picked up by Monroe, La., local police for contributing to the delinquency of a minor, a misdemeanor. During questioning, police brought up several murders in Louisiana and Nees’ murder in Montana.

In conditions Peter Camiel, a Seattle lawyer who has been working with Centurion Ministries on the case for about five years, described as “very unusual,” the Louisiana investigators prayed with Beach, threatened him and described in detail death by Louisiana’s electric chair, the Centurion report says.

Beach eventually confessed to killing Nees, although Camiel and the Centurion investigation allege Beach’s confession did not match the evidence found at Nees’ murder scene. They assert Beach’s confession was false.

Racicot said Beach’s confession was legitimate.

Beach is serving 100-years without the possibility of parole.