Not Guilty

"No matter how pure or kindly the motive," Connecticut Judge John A. Cornell instructed the jury, "the law does not justify one person's taking the life of another to save that other from suffering . . . even if the killing be done at the request of the person killed." In short, said the judge, there is no such thing as legal mercy killing.

He did not, however, rule out the possibility that the killer might have been made mentally unbalanced by the signs of such suffering. Five hours later, the jury of nine women and three men--all of them parents--announced its verdict in the case of Connecticut v. Carol Paight, the tall, 21-year-old blonde who had fired a bullet into the head of her cancer-ridden father to save him from a lingering, painful death (TIME, Feb. 6). The verdict: not guilty. Carol, the jurors decided, was temporarily insane when she killed her father.

While spectators packing the courtroom cheered in approval, pale Carol Paight sobbed with relief. "I'm so happy, I'm so happy," she said.

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