Guatemalan TV Shows Execution of 2 Men

Two members of a Guatemalan kidnapping ring were executed by lethal injection today as television broadcast the scene.

They were executed a week after President Alfonso Portillo sent several family members to Canada, fearing reprisal from the kidnappers' partners.

Guatemalans watching television saw one kidnapper, Amilcar Cetino Perez, as he was strapped to a gurney and mumbled a prayer when the chemicals flowed into his arm. Television showed the line of a heart monitor start to flatten, cutting back to a picture of Mr. Cetino's hand as it quivered, then lay still.

The second execution, of Tomas Cerrate Hernandez, began an hour later. The broadcast showed him shaking badly as he was led to the death chamber.

Mr. Cetino, 35, and Mr. Cerrate, 39, who had proclaimed their innocence, were sentenced for their role in the kidnapping of Isabel de Botran, an heir to a liquor fortune, in January 1997. Although her family paid a ransom, she was killed.