Fri May 09, 2003 03:22 PM ET
BUFFALO, N.Y. (Reuters) - Anti-abortion militant James Kopp was sentenced on Friday to 25 years to life in prison for the 1998 murder of a New York doctor, whom Kopp called a "mass murderer" for performing abortions.
Kopp, 48, spoke for more than 90 minutes, trying to justify the shooting, before being handed the maximum sentence for the slaying of Dr. Barnett Slepian.
Kopp admitted shooting Slepian on Oct. 23, 1998, with a high-powered rifle through the kitchen window of the doctor's home in Amherst, New York, a suburb of Buffalo near the border of Canada.
"They had a mass murderer living there," Kopp said at his sentencing before Erie County Judge Michael D'Amico. "My intention was to save children.
"Dr. Slepian had every opportunity to stop killing, and the children had no opportunity to run away from him," Kopp said.
Kopp fled the United States after the slaying, prompting an international manhunt.
He spent 2-1/2 years on the run in Mexico, Ireland and France before he was arrested in France in March 2001. He was extradited to the United States in 2002 only after France was assured he would not face the death penalty.
In chilling detail, Kopp described at his sentencing how he waited several nights in the woods behind Slepian's house before killing him.
He said he chose not to shoot Slepian outside his office out of concern for bystanders and claimed he only meant to hit him in the shoulder, not to kill him.
Slepian, 52 and a father of four, was an obstetrician-gynecologist who provided women's medical services and abortions at a suburban clinic.
In sentencing Kopp, the judge said: "In spite of all your education and intelligence, one thing you haven't learned is that the pursuit of your objectives or goals does not allow you to apply violence to your adversaries."
After waiving his right to a jury trial in favor of trial by a judge alone, Kopp was convicted of second-degree murder in March.
He also faces a federal trial on charges of interfering with the right to an abortion, and he has been charged with the nonfatal shooting of a doctor in Canada.
Slepian was among seven people killed in attacks on clinics or doctors from 1993 to 1998, underscoring that a woman's constitutional right to choose an abortion remains an intensely charged issue in the United States.
BUFFALO, N.Y. (Reuters) - Anti-abortion militant James Kopp was sentenced on Friday to 25 years to life in prison for the 1998 murder of a New York doctor, whom Kopp called a "mass murderer" for performing abortions.
Kopp, 48, spoke for more than 90 minutes, trying to justify the shooting, before being handed the maximum sentence for the slaying of Dr. Barnett Slepian.
Kopp admitted shooting Slepian on Oct. 23, 1998, with a high-powered rifle through the kitchen window of the doctor's home in Amherst, New York, a suburb of Buffalo near the border of Canada.
"They had a mass murderer living there," Kopp said at his sentencing before Erie County Judge Michael D'Amico. "My intention was to save children.
"Dr. Slepian had every opportunity to stop killing, and the children had no opportunity to run away from him," Kopp said.
Kopp fled the United States after the slaying, prompting an international manhunt.
He spent 2-1/2 years on the run in Mexico, Ireland and France before he was arrested in France in March 2001. He was extradited to the United States in 2002 only after France was assured he would not face the death penalty.
In chilling detail, Kopp described at his sentencing how he waited several nights in the woods behind Slepian's house before killing him.
He said he chose not to shoot Slepian outside his office out of concern for bystanders and claimed he only meant to hit him in the shoulder, not to kill him.
Slepian, 52 and a father of four, was an obstetrician-gynecologist who provided women's medical services and abortions at a suburban clinic.
In sentencing Kopp, the judge said: "In spite of all your education and intelligence, one thing you haven't learned is that the pursuit of your objectives or goals does not allow you to apply violence to your adversaries."
After waiving his right to a jury trial in favor of trial by a judge alone, Kopp was convicted of second-degree murder in March.
He also faces a federal trial on charges of interfering with the right to an abortion, and he has been charged with the nonfatal shooting of a doctor in Canada.
Slepian was among seven people killed in attacks on clinics or doctors from 1993 to 1998, underscoring that a woman's constitutional right to choose an abortion remains an intensely charged issue in the United States.
