Scott McClellan, a spokesman for Bush's presidential campaign, said the issue was not a campaign issue and referred calls to the governor's press office at the Texas Capitol. Michael Jones, a state employee at Bush's press office, said Bush "supports the laws that we have here in Texas and whose legality has been upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court." Jones added that Bush cannot commute McGinnis' sentence without the recommendation from the majority of the members of the state's board of pardons and paroles. Officials at the board have received a plea for clemency from McGinnis' lawyers and have begun reviewing it.

While Bush's spokesmen lob the death penalty issue back and forth, opponents of execution for juveniles are trying to apply political pressure. In a Dec. 10, 1999 letter, American Bar Association president William G. Paul asked Bush to spare McGinnis' life. The "execution of people for crimes they committed while children is unacceptable in a civilized society, irrespective of guilt or innocence. Executing this young man, and others who are on death row for their crimes committed as children, serves no principled purpose and only demeans our system of justice," Paul said. But if the Pope was unable to sway the governor to commute the death sentence of Karla Faye Tucker, there's no reason to think a group of trial lawyers will fare any better.

McGinnis, whose mother was a prostitute and a drug addict, is one of 26 death row inmates in Texas who were 17 at the time of their offense. Fourteen other states also have death row inmates who committed their crimes while juveniles. In all, the United States has 69 inmates awaiting their dates with death who were either 16 or 17 at the time of their crimes. And while Texas has far more juveniles on death row than any other state, Virginia is also facing controversy over the juvenile execution issue.

On Monday, Virginia executed Douglas Christopher Thomas, a murderer who shot his girlfriend's parents when he was 17. On Thursday the state plans to execute Steve Edward Roach, who was 17 when he killed his 70-year-old neighbor.

McGinnis' attorney, Ross D'Emanuele, contends that McGinnis was not given fair treatment during the sentencing phase of his trial. D'Emanuele, a Minneapolis attorney who will file a brief in Texas courts this week in an effort to halt the execution of his client, said that jurors were prevented from hearing the testimony of a psychologist who had examined McGinnis.

According to D'Emanuele, the psychologist found that McGinnis did not intend to harm or hurt anyone, would not pose a future danger to society and that he would do well in a structured environment. D'Emanuele said he has never questioned whether or not McGinnis committed the crime. "Our concern is with the sentencing phase of the trial. That's where the testimony of the psychologist would have been helpful."

D'Emanuele is hoping that Texas courts will respond to his arguments regarding international law, and he quickly ticks off all of the treaties that prohibit the execution of offenders under the age of 18: the International Convention on Civil and Political Rights, the U.N. Convention on the Rights of the Child and the American Convention on Human Rights.

In 1977, the United States signed the ICCPR. But the Senate refused to agree to the treaty's prohibition on executions of offenders who commit crimes while under age 18. The Convention on the Rights of the Child has become an accepted part of international law. However, two nations have still not signed the document: Somalia and the United States. The American Convention on Human Rights was finally ratified by the Organization of American States in 1969. It says that capital punishment "shall not be imposed upon persons who, at the time the crime was committed, were under 18 years of age."

Amnesty International has also weighed in on the issue juvenile executions. In a press release issued on Jan. 7, the human rights organization said that only four other countries, Iran, Pakistan, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia, still execute people for crimes committed while they were children. "The United States has executed 10 child offenders in the last decade, more than the rest of the world combined," says Amnesty International. "The four child offenders executed worldwide since 1997 were all killed in the U.S."

While human rights organizations are pushing Bush to spare McGinnis' life, prosecutors and the National Association for Crime Victims Rights are reminding citizens about McGinnis' crime, not his age. Michael McDougal, the district attorney in Montgomery County where McGinnis committed the murder, says he has personal reservations about meting out the death penalty to 17-year-olds. But he said that Texas law allows the practice and that the issue should be dealt with by the Texas Legislature, not Bush.

Personal reservations aside, McDougal believes McGinnis must be punished for his deed. McDougal points out that McGinnis was considered a repeat offender by Texas officials and that he committed the murder in Conroe less than a week after he got deferred adjudication in another crime. "In that case he ran over a driver after he attempted to take her car. With all that in there, I didn't feel it was a case that needed to be reconsidered," he said. "And the facts in this case are bad. When you shoot somebody four times that's not any kind of mistake. That's being cold-blooded and not caring about human life at all. That warrants the death penalty whether McGinnis is 17 or 45 or 50."

Raymond Montee of the National Association for Crime Victim Rights recently told the Orlando Sentinel that compassion for the juvenile murderers is misplaced. "Did they show compassion when they killed?" Montee asked. "If they've got a gun in their hand or a knife at your throat, what difference does it make how old they are?"

While Montee and others press for the execution of McGinnis and other juveniles, some ardent death penalty supporters are having second thoughts. Jim Mattox, a Democrat who served two terms as Texas Attorney General and oversaw more than 30 executions (none of them were juveniles) believes that Texas needs to re-examine the juvenile execution issue. Mattox believes Bush should "step in" to save McGinnis from the death chamber. "I don't think we ought to be executing juveniles," Mattox said. "That's just the bottom line."