Governor Corbett Signs Execution Warrants for Terry Ray Chamberlain, Andre Staton and David Richard Ramtahal

HARRISBURG, Pa., Aug. 17, 2012 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Governor Tom Corbett has signed execution warrants for three men, each of whom were convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death.

Terry Ray Chamberlain, Andre Staton and David Richard Ramtahal are scheduled to be executed in October. They are incarcerated at the State Correctional Institution at Greene. 

Terry Ray Chamberlain, 60, was found guilty of breaking into the home of his estranged wife, Sherri Chamberlain, and her boyfriend, Greg Inman, on Aug. 22, 1991, where he shot each of them multiple times, including an execution-style shot to the head.

A neighbor testified that on the morning of the murders, Mrs. Chamberlain telephoned her home, saying she and Inman had been shot, asking her to call an ambulance and identifying the gunman as Chamberlain. The neighbor's husband arrived at the home and found the pair dead. A Bradford County jury convicted Chamberlain of two counts of first-degree murder and returned two death sentences on May 13, 1994.

Chamberlain is scheduled to be executed on Oct. 9.

Andre Staton, 49, was found guilty of stabbing to death his former girlfriend, Beverly Yohn, despite a protection from abuse order against him. One of the victim's sons testified that, on the morning of Feb. 25, 2004, Staton kicked in the locked back door of their home, entered the kitchen, pulled out a knife and began stabbing his mother until she fell on the floor. Yohn died of multiple stab wounds to the heart and left jugular vein. A Blair County jury convicted Staton of first-degree murder and he was sentenced to death on May 3, 2006.

Staton is scheduled to be executed on Oct. 10.

David Richard Ramtahal, 28, was found guilty of shooting another man, Jarrett Osborne, as he ran to escape an attempted armed robbery. On Nov. 15, 2006, Ramtahal and another man, carrying guns and covering their faces, approached three men, their intended victims, who were standing on a street corner. Hearing the robbers, the three men fled. Ramtahal fired a shot, wounding Osborne initially, but the bullet traveled through his pelvis and severed an artery, causing high volume blood loss. An ambulance was called, but Osborne was pronounced dead in the hospital emergency room.

Ramtahal, who is also serving a life sentence for an unrelated murder in 2007, was sentenced to death in Bucks County Court on May 18, 2009. His accomplice in the Osborne killing pleaded guilty to third-degree murder and was sentenced to 12-to-24 years in state prison.

Ramtahal is scheduled to be executed on Oct. 11.

With these warrants, which were signed Thursday, Corbett has now signed 19 execution warrants.

Executions in Pennsylvania are carried out by lethal injection. For more information, visit the Department of Corrections online at www.cor.state.pa.us and select "Death Penalty" from the left-side navigation bar.

Media contact: Janet Kelley, 717-783-1116

SOURCE Pennsylvania Office of the Governor