Prosecutor to mull death penalty opposition in nuns' slaying

(AP) — A Mississippi prosecutor said she hasn't decided whether to seek the death penalty for a man charged with killing two nuns who dedicated their lives to helping people in one of the poorest counties in the nation.

Sanders — who had been living about 15 miles east of the sisters' Durant home — confessed to the killings but gave no reason, said Holmes County Sheriff Willie March, who was briefed by Durant police and Mississippi Bureau of Investigation officials who took part in Sanders' interrogation.

Hours before Sanders' court appearance, Bishop Joseph Kopacz and more than 20 priests from the Diocese of Jackson celebrated a memorial Mass at the small but ornate Cathedral of St. Peter in downtown Jackson, about an hour's drive south of Durant.

Hundreds of people attended, and the front pews were filled by family members and sisters from Held's and Merrill's religious orders, the Kentucky-based Sisters of Charity of Nazareth and the School Sisters of St. Francis of Milwaukee.

Sanders was on probation after a prison term for a felony drunken-driving conviction in Mississippi last year, said Grace Simmons Fisher, a spokeswoman for the Mississippi Department of Corrections.