A federal judge has rejected a request for a new hearing for an Oklahoma man on federal death row for the slayings of an Arkansas family.
U.S. District Judge Leon Holmes ruled Tuesday that Danny Lee of Yukon, Okla., needed to obtain authorization from the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to file another petition challenging his death sentence.
Lee was convicted in federal court in the 1996 slayings of gun dealer William Mueller, his wife, Nancy Mueller, and their young daughter, Sarah. Their bodies were found in a backwater of Illinois Bayou north of Russellville.
Prosecutors alleged that Lee and Chevie Kehoe wanted to steal the dealer's guns to start an army and establish a white supremacist nation in the Pacific Northwest.
Lee's attorneys wanted Lee's case reopened so they could challenge tests presented at trial that suggested Lee was a psychopath.