Sean Sellers
Encyclopedia
Sean Richard Sellers was an American
murder
er, one of 22 persons in the United States since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976 to be executed for a crime committed while under the age of 18. He was also the only person during this period to be executed for a crime committed under the age of 17. His case drew worldwide attention due to his age as well as his jailhouse conversion to Christianity
and his claim that demonic possession
made him innocent of his crimes.
clerk in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
. Sellers later admitted on his website that he killed Bower because the man had refused to sell him beer and because he wanted to see "what it felt like". He surprised the Circle K
convenience store clerk while he was drinking coffee, then pursued the wounded man across the store and shot him again (killing him).
On March 5, 1986, Sellers killed his mother, Vonda Bellofatto, and his stepfather, Lee Bellofatto, while they were asleep in the bedroom of their Oklahoma City home. Sellers tried to disguise his guilt by arranging the crime scene to look as if an intruder had committed the killings.
at the time of the murders and that demonic possession made him murder his victims. In later documents, he claimed to have read The Satanic Bible
by Anton Lavey
"hundreds of times" between the ages of 15 and 16, when the crimes were committed, and in a "Confession" letter written from prison, he reflected on this period of his life: "I got very involved in Satanism. I truly thought it was an honest way to live, and the rituals of it would enable me to control my life." His attorneys also argued Sellers was addicted to the game "Dungeons & Dragons
", although Sellers would later write that the game had no part in his crimes and that "using my past as a common example of the effects of the game is either irrational or fanatical."
The jury refused to consider either claim, and Sellers was found guilty of multiple homicides and sentenced to death in 1986. At the time, Oklahoma law did not give juries the option of giving a life sentence without the possibility of parole (that choice became available in 1987). One juror later said that the jury felt Sellers would be paroled in 7 to 14 years, and this prison term was not lengthy enough. So the jury opted for the death penalty. Other jurors denied this was part of the deliberations.
, Sellers made numerous appearances in the mass media, appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show and on a notorious segment of Geraldo about Satanism. He also appeared in documentaries about Satanism and serial killer
s for 48 Hours
, MSNBC
and the A&E Network
. Sellers married in prison on February 14, 1995, but the marriage was annulled in 1997.
Sellers' step-siblings refused to believe that his conversion to Christianity was a sincere one. Of his many surviving family members, only his step-grandfather believed his conversion to be sincere. Prison officials also refused to believe he had converted, except for the prison chaplain.
, Sellers contended he was suffering from a multiple personality disorder
. The appellate court ruled that there was "uncontroverted evidence" of Sellers's religious conversion and that he may indeed suffer from multiple personality disorder. The panel of judges concluded that while Sellers might have been insane at the time of his crimes, the claim was made too late to be raised on appeal. Psychiatric experts scoffed at Seller's claim, arguing that any true mental illness would have been diagnosed soon after Sellers' arrest and not seven years later. Prison officials also cast doubt on Sellers' mental illness by saying they saw Sellers rehearsing the evidence of mental illness and receiving coaching from his attorneys. Sellers made the same insanity claim to his clemency board, but the board refused to consider the issue. The board appeared to be swayed by prison officials' statements, the lengthy time delay in diagnosing the illness, and statements by Sellers' accomplice that he had seen no evidence of multiple personality. "The only thing that worried him was getting caught", Richard Howard wrote.
Sellers appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the court declined his appeal.
Two days before his execution, Sellers filed two more appeals. The first appeal, made in federal district court, accused the state Pardon and Parole Board of violating his civil rights. Sellers argued the pardon board's decisions were not impartial and capricious. The appeal was denied, the issue having been considered and rejected by state courts numerous times (and recently as well). A second appeal, filed with the state Court of Criminal Appeals, claimed the state appellate court made a mistake by ruling Sellers had waived his insanity claim at trial. The state appellate court admitted it used the wrong legal justification in deciding Sellers' waiver of mental illness, but nevertheless rejected Sellers' appeal after reconsidering the case on the merits raised by Sellers' defense team.
Sellers' imminent execution brought condemnation from a wide variety of sources, including the European Union
, Archbishop Desmond Tutu
, the American Bar Association
and Bianca Jagger
. Nearly all raised issues about his age at the time of the crimes, and many argued that his religious work from prison outweighed the state's need to execute him.
Sellers was executed by lethal injection
at 12:17 a.m. on February 4, 1999. He spoke to his step-siblings, saying, "All the people who are hating me right now and are here waiting to see me die, when you wake up in the morning, you aren't going to feel any different." Sellers did not mention his mother or apologize for what he had done. His statement outraged his step-siblings. Noelle Terry, his stepsister, later said, "He basically addressed the fact that we would still feel the same. It is very presumptuous that he would know how we would still feel." His last words were a modern Christian music song: "Set my spirit free that I might praise Thee. Set my spirit free that I might worship Thee."
, later decided it was unconstitutional to execute an individual for a crime committed under the age of 18.
While in prison, Sellers authored a book of love stories and poems titled Shuladore. The book was self-published, and sold via his Web site. Under Oklahoma law, a defendant cannot "receive any proceeds or profits from any source" as a direct or indirect result of his crime. An Oklahoma grand jury investigated whether Sellers or his friends received profits from the sale of the book, but no indictment was forthcoming. A Christian book publisher issued Sellers' autobiography, Web of Darkness, in 1999 shortly before his death.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
er, one of 22 persons in the United States since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976 to be executed for a crime committed while under the age of 18. He was also the only person during this period to be executed for a crime committed under the age of 17. His case drew worldwide attention due to his age as well as his jailhouse conversion to Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
and his claim that demonic possession
Demonic possession
Demonic possession is held by many belief systems to be the control of an individual by a malevolent supernatural being. Descriptions of demonic possessions often include erased memories or personalities, convulsions, “fits” and fainting as if one were dying...
made him innocent of his crimes.
Crimes
On September 8, 1985, 16-year-old Sean Sellers killed Robert Bower, a convenience storeConvenience store
A convenience store, corner store, corner shop, commonly called a bodega in Spanish-speaking areas of the United States, is a small store or shop in a built up area that stocks a range of everyday items such as groceries, toiletries, alcoholic and soft drinks, and may also offer money order and...
clerk in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City is the capital and the largest city in the state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, the city ranks 31st among United States cities in population. The city's population, from the 2010 census, was 579,999, with a metro-area population of 1,252,987 . In 2010, the Oklahoma...
. Sellers later admitted on his website that he killed Bower because the man had refused to sell him beer and because he wanted to see "what it felt like". He surprised the Circle K
Circle K
Circle K is an international chain of convenience stores, founded in 1951, in El Paso, Texas, United States. It is owned and operated by the Canadian-based Alimentation Couche-Tard.-Overview:...
convenience store clerk while he was drinking coffee, then pursued the wounded man across the store and shot him again (killing him).
On March 5, 1986, Sellers killed his mother, Vonda Bellofatto, and his stepfather, Lee Bellofatto, while they were asleep in the bedroom of their Oklahoma City home. Sellers tried to disguise his guilt by arranging the crime scene to look as if an intruder had committed the killings.
Avowal of Satanism at trial
At his trial, Sellers claimed he was a practicing SatanistSatanism
Satanism is a group of religions that is composed of a diverse number of ideological and philosophical beliefs and social phenomena. Their shared feature include symbolic association with, admiration for the character of, and even veneration of Satan or similar rebellious, promethean, and...
at the time of the murders and that demonic possession made him murder his victims. In later documents, he claimed to have read The Satanic Bible
The Satanic Bible
The Satanic Bible is a collection of essays, observations, and rituals published by Anton LaVey in 1969. It contains the core principles of LaVeyan Satanism, and is considered the foundation of its philosophy and dogma. It has been described as the most important document to influence contemporary...
by Anton Lavey
Anton LaVey
Anton Szandor LaVey , born Howard Stanton Levey, was the founder of the Church of Satan as well as a writer, occultist, and musician...
"hundreds of times" between the ages of 15 and 16, when the crimes were committed, and in a "Confession" letter written from prison, he reflected on this period of his life: "I got very involved in Satanism. I truly thought it was an honest way to live, and the rituals of it would enable me to control my life." His attorneys also argued Sellers was addicted to the game "Dungeons & Dragons
Dungeons & Dragons
Dungeons & Dragons is a fantasy role-playing game originally designed by Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson, and first published in 1974 by Tactical Studies Rules, Inc. . The game has been published by Wizards of the Coast since 1997...
", although Sellers would later write that the game had no part in his crimes and that "using my past as a common example of the effects of the game is either irrational or fanatical."
The jury refused to consider either claim, and Sellers was found guilty of multiple homicides and sentenced to death in 1986. At the time, Oklahoma law did not give juries the option of giving a life sentence without the possibility of parole (that choice became available in 1987). One juror later said that the jury felt Sellers would be paroled in 7 to 14 years, and this prison term was not lengthy enough. So the jury opted for the death penalty. Other jurors denied this was part of the deliberations.
Religious conversion to Christianity
Sellers became a Christian while in prison. His friends started a website http://www.seansellers.com on his behalf, and he campaigned for clemency based on his religious conversion, age and involvement in Satanism. While on death rowDeath row
Death row signifies the place, often a section of a prison, that houses individuals awaiting execution. The term is also used figuratively to describe the state of awaiting execution , even in places where no special facility or separate unit for condemned inmates exists.After individuals are found...
, Sellers made numerous appearances in the mass media, appearing on The Oprah Winfrey Show and on a notorious segment of Geraldo about Satanism. He also appeared in documentaries about Satanism and serial killer
Serial killer
A serial killer, as typically defined, is an individual who has murdered three or more people over a period of more than a month, with down time between the murders, and whose motivation for killing is usually based on psychological gratification...
s for 48 Hours
48 Hours (TV series)
48 Hours is a documentary and news program broadcast on the CBS television network since January 19, 1988. The program originally presented documentaries of various events related to a particular subject occurring within a 48-hour period, and is credited as one of the first to air a "reality show"...
, MSNBC
MSNBC
MSNBC is a cable news channel based in the United States available in the US, Germany , South Africa, the Middle East and Canada...
and the A&E Network
A&E Network
The A&E Network is a United States-based cable and satellite television network with headquarters in New York City and offices in Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, London, Los Angeles and Stamford. A&E also airs in Canada and Latin America. Initially named the Arts & Entertainment Network, A&E launched...
. Sellers married in prison on February 14, 1995, but the marriage was annulled in 1997.
Sellers' step-siblings refused to believe that his conversion to Christianity was a sincere one. Of his many surviving family members, only his step-grandfather believed his conversion to be sincere. Prison officials also refused to believe he had converted, except for the prison chaplain.
Appeals and execution
During his 1999 appeal to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of AppealsUnited States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit
The United States Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit is a federal court with appellate jurisdiction over the district courts in the following districts:* District of Colorado* District of Kansas...
, Sellers contended he was suffering from a multiple personality disorder
Dissociative identity disorder
Dissociative identity disorder is a psychiatric diagnosis and describes a condition in which a person displays multiple distinct identities , each with its own pattern of perceiving and interacting with the environment....
. The appellate court ruled that there was "uncontroverted evidence" of Sellers's religious conversion and that he may indeed suffer from multiple personality disorder. The panel of judges concluded that while Sellers might have been insane at the time of his crimes, the claim was made too late to be raised on appeal. Psychiatric experts scoffed at Seller's claim, arguing that any true mental illness would have been diagnosed soon after Sellers' arrest and not seven years later. Prison officials also cast doubt on Sellers' mental illness by saying they saw Sellers rehearsing the evidence of mental illness and receiving coaching from his attorneys. Sellers made the same insanity claim to his clemency board, but the board refused to consider the issue. The board appeared to be swayed by prison officials' statements, the lengthy time delay in diagnosing the illness, and statements by Sellers' accomplice that he had seen no evidence of multiple personality. "The only thing that worried him was getting caught", Richard Howard wrote.
Sellers appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the court declined his appeal.
Two days before his execution, Sellers filed two more appeals. The first appeal, made in federal district court, accused the state Pardon and Parole Board of violating his civil rights. Sellers argued the pardon board's decisions were not impartial and capricious. The appeal was denied, the issue having been considered and rejected by state courts numerous times (and recently as well). A second appeal, filed with the state Court of Criminal Appeals, claimed the state appellate court made a mistake by ruling Sellers had waived his insanity claim at trial. The state appellate court admitted it used the wrong legal justification in deciding Sellers' waiver of mental illness, but nevertheless rejected Sellers' appeal after reconsidering the case on the merits raised by Sellers' defense team.
Sellers' imminent execution brought condemnation from a wide variety of sources, including the European Union
European Union
The European Union is an economic and political union of 27 independent member states which are located primarily in Europe. The EU traces its origins from the European Coal and Steel Community and the European Economic Community , formed by six countries in 1958...
, Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Desmond Tutu
Desmond Mpilo Tutu is a South African activist and retired Anglican bishop who rose to worldwide fame during the 1980s as an opponent of apartheid...
, the American Bar Association
American Bar Association
The American Bar Association , founded August 21, 1878, is a voluntary bar association of lawyers and law students, which is not specific to any jurisdiction in the United States. The ABA's most important stated activities are the setting of academic standards for law schools, and the formulation...
and Bianca Jagger
Bianca Jagger
Bianca Jagger is a Nicaraguan-born social and human rights advocate and a former actress and model...
. Nearly all raised issues about his age at the time of the crimes, and many argued that his religious work from prison outweighed the state's need to execute him.
Sellers was executed by lethal injection
Lethal injection
Lethal injection is the practice of injecting a person with a fatal dose of drugs for the express purpose of causing the immediate death of the subject. The main application for this procedure is capital punishment, but the term may also be applied in a broad sense to euthanasia and suicide...
at 12:17 a.m. on February 4, 1999. He spoke to his step-siblings, saying, "All the people who are hating me right now and are here waiting to see me die, when you wake up in the morning, you aren't going to feel any different." Sellers did not mention his mother or apologize for what he had done. His statement outraged his step-siblings. Noelle Terry, his stepsister, later said, "He basically addressed the fact that we would still feel the same. It is very presumptuous that he would know how we would still feel." His last words were a modern Christian music song: "Set my spirit free that I might praise Thee. Set my spirit free that I might worship Thee."
Aftermath
Sellers was the first and remains the only person executed in the U.S. for a crime committed under the age of 17 since the reinstatement of the death penalty in 1976. The U.S. Supreme Court ruling in Roper v. SimmonsRoper v. Simmons
Roper v. Simmons, was a decision in which the Supreme Court of the United States held that it is unconstitutional to impose capital punishment for crimes committed while under the age of 18. The 5-4 decision overruled the Court's prior ruling upholding such sentences on offenders above or at the...
, later decided it was unconstitutional to execute an individual for a crime committed under the age of 18.
While in prison, Sellers authored a book of love stories and poems titled Shuladore. The book was self-published, and sold via his Web site. Under Oklahoma law, a defendant cannot "receive any proceeds or profits from any source" as a direct or indirect result of his crime. An Oklahoma grand jury investigated whether Sellers or his friends received profits from the sale of the book, but no indictment was forthcoming. A Christian book publisher issued Sellers' autobiography, Web of Darkness, in 1999 shortly before his death.
See also
- Napoleon BeazleyNapoleon BeazleyNapoleon Beazley was a convicted murderer executed by lethal injection by the State of Texas for the murder of 63-year-old Texas businessman John Luttig in 1994. Beazley shot Luttig in his garage on April 19, 1994 in order to steal his family's Mercedes-Benz car...
- Capital punishment in the United StatesCapital punishment in the United StatesCapital punishment in the United States, in practice, applies only for aggravated murder and more rarely for felony murder. Capital punishment was a penalty at common law, for many felonies, and was enforced in all of the American colonies prior to the Declaration of Independence...