High court upholds death penalty case

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - The Indiana Supreme Court has unanimously upheld the death sentence for a man who admitted raping and killing a 15-year-old girl in a brutal attack at her southern Indiana home.

The court in its ruling Tuesday rejected 36-year-old Roy Lee Ward's arguments that the jurors were improperly picked and that prosecutors had presented insufficient evidence to prove he mutilated and tortured Stacy Payne in the attack.

Ward pleaded guilty two years ago to murder and rape charges for the 2001 stabbing death of Payne at her family's home in Dale, about 30 miles east of Evansville.

His first conviction and death sentence for the attack was overturned in 2004 due to pretrial publicity. A second jury from central Indiana's Clay County deliberated less than 45 minutes before unanimously recommending the death penalty.