Last-minute stay of US execution

Michael Ross had been due to die early on Saturday

The execution of a serial killer who wants to die has been halted, an hour before it was to happen in the US state of Connecticut, at his lawyer's asking.

The latest twist came hours after the Supreme Court rejected a final appeal to save Michael Ross, who murdered eight women aged 14 to 25 in the 1980s.

His execution by lethal injection would be Connecticut's first for 45 years.

His attorney said he was seeking the postponement for 48 hours because of a possible conflict of interest.

Lawyer TR Paulding said that his client had not requested the delay.

His request apparently came as a result of a phone call from a district court judge, Robert Chatigny, who put a restraining order on the execution last Monday.

Judge Chatigny accused Mr Paulding of withholding information about Ross' competence to waive his appeals, and the lawyer said he would spend the weekend considering "appropriate steps".

The execution has now been put back from 0201 (0701 GMT) on Saturday to 2100 on Monday (0200 GMT Tuesday).

Final appeal

Ross spent 17 years fighting against his execution, but recently changed his mind.

I respect the judges on this panel, but they got it dead wrong Antonio Ponvert Lawyer for Dan Ross, father of Michael

Judge Chatigny put a restraining order on the execution based on affidavits from what he said were "serious people" that the killer was not competent.

A federal appeals court reversed the decision on Friday, saying it could find no case law establishing the right of relatives to challenge the death sentence on their own behalf.

But it stayed its order to allow an appeal by Ross' father Dan to the Supreme Court, which was rejected late on Friday.

Dan Ross' lawyer Antonio Ponvert said the appeals court had made a mistake.

"I respect the judges on this panel, but they got it dead wrong," he told the Associated Press news agency. "There is without question sufficiently serious questions on the merits of this case to make them fair game for litigation."

'Cruel and inhumane'

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said that if Ross decided at the last minute to appeal against the execution, "the machinery of death will stop".

The last person to be executed in Connecticut was Joseph "Mad Dog" Taborsky. He went to the electric chair in 1960.

Since then the state has replaced electrocution with lethal injection, but human rights group the American Civil Liberties Union of Connecticut believes it is a "cruel and inhumane" procedure.

Correspondents say death penalty opponents in the north-eastern US could have a domino effect across the mostly liberal region.