European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - September 06, 1989, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Wednesday. Septembers. 1989 the stars and stripes Page 7 Jerry Lewis telethon tops $78 million Las vegas a the 24th annual Jerry Lewis labor Day telethon wrap Ped up monday with the comic coaxing $78.438.573 in Cash and pledges from about 100 million viewers and from corporations. Viewers contributed $42.209.727 and corporations s36.22x.846 during the 21 a hour event which featured a Parade of top name entertainers and Poi Gnant stories from muscular dystrophy victims and their families. Lewis opened the show sunday night by saying that inroads had been made against 40 neuromuscular diseases that inc muscular dystrophy association is involved in fighting. Lewis called the advances stunning to the heart stunning to the  As in previous years victims and their families on the show provided most of the telethon s heart tugging moments. United airlines executive Bob Samp son Drew a standing ovation from 2,000 people in the Jerry Lewis theater at the Cashman Field Center saying there s been enough of this disease killing Chil Dren and devastating  Sampson who has suffered from mus Cular dystrophy since he was a teen Ager and has lost two grandchildren to the disease appeared in a poignant Appeal and encouraged viewers to keep up the fight until the disease is Defeated. Sampson told Lewis last week he would rather not be on the telethon this year because it was too hard on him emotionally. Lewis said he persuade Sampson to return because he has been an inspiration in the annual event. Lewis was moved to tears when for Mer High school football coach Charlie wed Meyer subject of the to movie Sammy Davis or. And Liza Minnelli arc among 50 stars on the Jerry u is telethon. Quiet Victory said. You never know which Dollar it will be to make the differ ence and win the   of los Galos. Calif., is paralysed by Amy trophic la eral sclerosis also known As Lou Cie Rig s  conveyed his message through his wife Lucy who read his lips. So often i feel i am a prisoner in my own body that has been Given a life sen tence cd Meyer said. But i have chosen with god s help to turn this Dis advantage into an  the Oak Ridge boys stopped the show sunday when they introduced 11-year old Bradley Thomas Walker of Hunts Villa ala., the Alabama poster child for the muscular dystrophy association. They then Sang their hit  with the youngster. Lewis has been a spokesman for the new York City based muscular dystrophy association for 40 years conducting the annual labor Day telethon for the Benefit of Jerry s kids since 1966. Lewis said last week the 1989 telethon would have a special meaning. This Spring Lewis 63. And his 38-year-old wife Sam Learned she was pregnant then were told May 5 that the heart in the fetus had stopped beating. Mrs. Lewis was two months pregnant at the time. Lewis has six sons by a pre Vious marriage. Famed heart surgeon Michael Deba key of Houston said great strides arc being made to find the cause and cure for muscular dystrophy. The future is so optimistic so  said. "1 think it s wonderful that the american people can be assured that the Money Given to this great cause will find a solution and eliminate the  renegade priest denies having Gay relationship by the Washington Post Washington the Rev. George Augustus Seal Lings or. Said monday he will not dignify with a response the scurrilous and baseless allegation by a for Mer altar boy that in 1977, when he was 16, he had a sexual relationship with Stallings. Stallings who defied Catholic authorities in june by founding the Imani Temple an Independent african american Catholic congregation made the comment in a written statement issued in response to the report of the allegation sunday by the Washington Post. He declined monday to be interviewed. I believe that this charge and accusation is a concerted Effort to divert attention from my Mission an message to make the african american experience valid and whole and to drive racial  and racism out of the Catholic Church which i love so much Stallings said in the statement. I have no further  monday 40 of Stallings supporters picketed silently outside the shrine of the sacred heart in mount pleasant where Cardinal James a. Hickey who has clashed with the dissident priest celebrated a labor Day mass. Hickey everybody s got a closet one sign  the mass. Hickey read a Brief Handwritten statement to reporters i was sorry to read the Allega Tion in today s Post. If it is True then i feel great sorrow and sympathy for everyone involved in what was described in today s Post Story especially the Young  Hickey said he will be watching the mat Ter. He would not answer questions. The Post reported monday that the former altar boy now 28, swore in a signed statement that he repeatedly had sexual relations with the priest in the rectory of St. Teresa of Avila Catholic Church in Southeast Washington Over a three to four month period in 1977. He said he broke off the relationship and never reported it to Church authorities. In a separate incident three years ago the Post reported one person wrote a letter to Hickey alleging that Stal Lings was having a sexual relationship with a male relative of the person. An archdiocesan inquiry ended after the person who wrote the letter refused to talk. The Post also reported that this summer Mickey. Confronted Stallings with concerns about Stallings life style including whether Stallings had engaged in any homosexual behaviour which would violate his priestly vow of celibacy. Hickey refused to appoint shillings to a new Parish unless Stallings sought treatment at a Church Hospital that special is in treating paedophilia and other Dis orders sources said. Stallings refused to seek treat ment and shortly thereafter on june 19, he announced he was starting his own Church to meet the spiritual and cultural needs of african american Cath  in his written statement monday declining requests for interviews Stallings said All sane people should refuse to Box with shadows apparently referring to he Post s use of the Man s allegation without publish ing has name. The Man had agreed that the Post could disclose his name to Stallings before publication but Stallings twice declined the offer and would not discuss the matter. Death Row decisions haunt sex Calif governor san Francisco a former gov. Edmund Pat Brown once let a death Row inmate die to get a Bill through the legislature and he s still haunted by the Lile and death Power he held Over 59 prisoners. Brown emerges As an opponent of the death penalty in Public Justice private mercy the 163-Page Memoir of his decisions to Grant or withhold clemency from prisoners facing death sentences while he was governor from 1959-67."it was an awesome ultimate Power Over the lives of others that no person or government should have or crave Brown writes. Each decision look some thing Oul of me thai nothing not family or work or Hope for the future has Ever been Able to  commuted 23 death sentences the most of any California governor. He denied clemency in 36 other cases. The decisions were some of the most agonizing he Ever made. Brown said inthe Book he wrote with Dick Adler. It was published last month by  &  of the 23 prisoners whose sentences Brown commuted were released on parole. One was later convict cd of murder. Pcs pile his opposition to capital punishment. Brown recalled after learn ing about the 1975 murder he stated he would have been willing to Trade All 23 lives for the life of the killer s victim. There is a message for future governors particularly opponents of capital punish ment the tension Between Justice and mercy May be impossible to resolve especially in a heated Arena iof political ambitions and Public  slate put More than 500 people to death from 1851 to 1967. In 1976, the . Supreme court allowed states to resume executions but Liberal California chief Justice Rose Bird threw out Many death sentences. Since a More conserva Tive court took Over after Bird s defeat in 1986, stale Laws have changed to make executions  his Book Brown writes thai he found inc moral and political decisions became hopelessly entangled in the Case of Richard Lindsey a drifter convicted of raping and murdering a 6-year-old girl in a Kern county farm labor Camp in 1961.As Brown describes it. He was seriously considering clemency for Lindsey who though legally sane had been men tally disturbed for Many years. But the governor also sought legislative approval of a minimum wage Law for migrant workers and he needed the vote of Akern county lawmaker who wanted Lindsey  i citing Richard Lindsey go to inc Gas chamber i was giving the victim s parents and people like them a Chance at a living wage Brown writes. Lindsey died and the legislation passed. Brown criticizes some of his actions and appears to have been genuinely wrestling with two principles his per Sonal opposition to capital punishment and his belief he was elected to uphold inc Law including inc death penalty. Brown is less convincing in describing his decision not to commute the death Scal Cnoc of Caryl Chessman who was convict cd of a siring of kidnappings and rapes and who spent 12 years on death Row before he was executed in May i960.Brown said Chessman was a Nasty arrogant unrepentant Man but Proba Bly did nol deserve to die because he had t killed  concludes that the death penalty is unfair irrational and ineffective but that it will not be abolished until More people realize How inhumane it is