DEATH ROW CANDIDATES

Among the Illinois defendants who face capital punishment if convicted:

— Christopher Coleman, a Columbia, Ill., man charged with strangling his wife and their two sons.

— Christopher Vaughn, a Will County man charged with fatally shooting his wife and three children in the family's sport utility vehicle

— Nicholas Sheley of Sterling, Ill., who has been charged in a two-state killing rampage that left eight people dead in 2008

ALREADY ON DEATH ROW

— Rodney Adkins (Cook County) — Murdered Oak Park resident Catherine McAvinchey in 1983.

— Teodoro Baez (Cook County) — Killed two people in a 1999 Chicago-area drug dispute, then dismembered the bodies with a sword.

— Dion Banks (Cook County) — Shot a woman to death in front of her two young sons in a 2001 carjacking.

— Joseph Bannister (Cook County) — Attacked his ex-girlfriend and killed her sister in 2000.

— David A. Damm (Jo Daviess County) — Murdered 13-year-old Donnisha Hill.

— Brian J. Dugan (DuPage County) — Raped and murdered Jeanine Nicarico, 10, after abducting her from her Naperville home while she was home sick from school. (Two other men were earlier sent to death row for the crime, then exonerated.)

— Eric Hanson (DuPage County) — Murdered his parents, sister and brother-in-law in 2005.

— Richardo Harris (Cook County) — Killed two liquor store clerks in a 1999 robbery.

— Anthony B. Mertz (Coles County) — Murdered and mutilated Eastern Illinois University student Shannon McNamara, 21, in 2001. He told jurors he was drunk and wasn't certain whether he'd committed the crime.

— Gary D. Pate (White County) — Convicted in the 2006 shooting deaths of his estranged wife and her 19-year-old daughter.

— Daniel B. Ramsey (Hancock County) — Shot to death two girls, ages 12 and 16, during an attack on his former girlfriend.

— Paul F. Runge (Cook County) — Raped and murdered a woman and her 10-year-old daughter in their Chicago apartment in 1997.

— Cecil S. Sutherland (Jefferson County) — Abducted, raped and murdered 10-year-old Amy Schulz of Kell, Ill., in 1987.

— Edward Tenney (DuPage County) — Shot a stranded motorist four times in the head at close range in 1992.

— Andrew Urdiales (Livingston County) — Murdered a 21-year-old woman.

http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/g...b4ec262e0.html