`But Vernita Will Never Come Back'
Family members quiet as killer is put to death


BY LIZA BERGER
KENOSHA NEWS


LUCASVILLE, Ohio -- Juanita Wheat sat staring as Alton Coleman was dying. She did not take her eyes off the man who came into her life nearly 18 years ago and murdered her 9year-old daughter.

Neither could the other family members. The closed-circuit TV room was quiet Friday except for a soft humming as family members of victims watched the execution of Coleman. As they sat in the room, their eyes were glued on the static shot of him on two 25-inch TV screens.

``This has been a torment thing, a very sad torment thing,'' a visibly weakened Wheat said.

Wheat became a sought-after woman in Lucasville, with the throng of reporters and cameramen lining up for interviews from the time she arrived. Uncomfortable with being thrust into the spotlight, her answers to questions were short and to the point.

``This brought all those things that happened back then back again,'' Wheat said, with a camera's bright light forcing her to squint as she answered. ``It's over as for Coleman. That's over, but Vernita will never come back. That will not change.''

Wheat was one of only two witnesses who spoke after the execution.

The other speaker was Mary Hilliard, grandmother of Tamika Turks, 7, of Indiana, another victim of Coleman's killing spree in 1984.

Coleman killed at least five other people.

While there have been three other executions recently, this execution was the first time there was a closed-circuit area because of the scope of his crimes.

Families came from throughout the Midwest to see it. All family members except for the Walters family watched it from the closed circuit area.

Coleman died for murdering Marlene Walters at her home on July 13, 1984. Her husband, Harry, was present at the execution.

Harry Storey, father of 15year-old victim Tonnie Storey, came to the execution in a wheelchair. He was holding his picture of Tonnie.

Linked together by their mutual grief, more than 15 family members, almost all of them black, gathered behind the podium in the press room of Southern Ohio Correctional Facility following the execution.

Hilliard had a different focus than Wheat about Coleman's execution. She said she wants Coleman's accomplice Debra Brown to receive the same treatment as he did.

Brown is currently serving a life sentence in Ohio and has a death sentence in Indiana.

``We want her back in Indiana,'' Hilliard said. ``We want the same thing that happened to him to her.

``What they've taken from us they cannot give back.''

As they watched the execution, families looked intently at the man who took their loved ones. Not showing much expression, they just watched the screens, even when the execution was over and Coleman's image was gone.