BOSTON – A drifter who was sentenced to death in the carjack killings of two Massachusetts men will ask a new jury to spare his life at a retrial that's set to get underway in Boston.
Gary Sampson was sentenced to death in 2003, but a judge granted him a new sentencing trial in 2011.
Sampson pleaded guilty to killing 69-year-old Philip McCloskey and 19-year-old Jonathan Rizzo during a weeklong crime rampage in 2001. He was convicted separately in New Hampshire in the killing of a former city councilor from Concord.
The new jury will be asked to decide Sampson's punishment: life in prison or the death penalty.
Massachusetts abolished the death penalty in 1984, but Sampson was prosecuted under federal law.
Opening statements are scheduled for Wednesday in federal court.
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