Terre Haute shuns notoriety of execution

TERRE HAUTE -- "It's just a big mess," sighed Eric Holt, nervously brushing imaginary lint off of his polo shirt. "It's gotten to the point where I don't care. But it'll all be over Monday."\nHolt and other residents of the redbrick factory town near the Illinois border have settled into a weary resignation toward the imminent execution of Timothy McVeigh. The convicted Oklahoma City bomber -- responsible for the deaths of 168, including 19 children -- will be put to death by lethal injection at 7 a.m. today.\nWhile the city has long had a good relationship with the U.S. Penitentiary on its southwest outskirts, many residents shun the glare of the spotlight. They shun the notoriety that comes with the first federal execution in 38 years.\n"We're just a reluctant participant," said Rod Henry, president of the Greater Terre Haute Chamber of Commerce. "We have no choice in the matter. All we can do is put our community's best foot forward."\nEven those who support capital punishment in principle and McVeigh's death in particular fear the high-profile execution will taint the city's reputation. After all, it's a quiet industrial town filled with lumberyards and smokestacks, boarded storefronts and train tracks. It looks as though it hasn't left the 1920s -- advertisements for Clabber Girl Baking Powder, a local product, adorn the trash cans along the lonely downtown strip.\nBut like a Biblical plague of locusts, more than 1,300 reporters have descended on the quiet town just off the Wabash River. All throughout the weekend, they've scampered around the prison grounds with laptops and nickel-chain press credentials, setting up cables and television cameras. A battalion of news vans -- crammed bumper to bumper -- rest just inside the gate of the 1,100-acre facility.\nMany members of the press hail from across the Atlantic. The United States is the only industrialized country in the world that practices capital punishment, and interest in McVeigh's execution is keen among Europeans.\n"It's difficult for us to understand how it's normal and accepted," said Twan Huys, a correspondent for a Dutch National Public Radio outlet based just outside of Amsterdam. "I suppose it's the cowboy mentality. In the Netherlands, something like 70 percent of the people oppose the death penalty."\nWorking out of Washington, Huys only ventures out of the capitol to cover bigger events. Watching a photographer pace down the side of the road in the hope of getting a good shot of the distant prison, Huys claims he's never seen anything like it.\n"I even went to both of the political conventions," he said. "And that doesn't compare to the media frenzy I see here."\nBut reporters and network producers weren't the only ones roaming around the prison grounds this weekend. Police cars man every intersection on Ind. 63, the only route to the prison. Officers with sidearms and black bulletproof vests paced around, keeping an eye out for suspicious motorists.\nSince Saturday, the officers have been working 12-hour shifts instead of the usual eight. More than half of the department's 120 officers will be on duty at 7 a.m. today -- along with the Indiana State Police, 50 U.S. Marshals, 30 FBI agents and several officers from nearby municipalities such as Brazil.\nThat's not including the Vigo County's Sheriff's Department and the more than 600 Bureau of Prison employees that will be on hand. Fearing some kind of retribution from far-right militia groups, prison and law enforcement officials say security is as tight as a drum.\nThe Federal Aviation Administration has even issued a flight restriction around the penitentiary grounds that started at 4 p.m. Sunday. Charles Goodwin, director of the Terre Haute International Airport-Hulman Field, said the order -- which prohibits flying within one mile of the prison -- is in effect through Monday.\nFriday, Gov. Frank O'Bannon announced the closure of all state offices in Vigo County. Most federal offices will also be closed, as will all city and county government agencies.\nBut the rest of the city will be working overtime -- restaurants and hotels have been bustling with business. With the Miss Indiana Pageant coinciding with the execution, every hotel room in town has been booked.\nMany entrepreneurs have even been trying to capitalize off of the event.\nRaoul David, who owns a grocery store across the street from the penitentiary, has been working around the clock. Journalists march in and out of his food mart, and he's been hawking what he describes as his "McVeigh Special": shish-ka-bobs marinated in soy sauce.\nDavid isn't the only one trying to make a buck off of what locals frequently describe as a circus.\nDebbie Walker, the owner of a downtown tattoo and body-piercing parlor, has been selling souvenir T-shirts for $20 a piece. As of early evening Saturday, only four were left in stock.\n"I've gone through at least 30 dozen," said Walker, a 50s-ish woman in a low-cut black dress. "I've been selling 'em as far away as Germany and Japan. Hell, Dave Letterman called last week, and he bought one."\nDesigned like a newspaper front page, the "Terre Haute Extra Hangin' Times" design features a headline that screams, "DIE MOTHERFUCKER DIE!" A tamer version simply reads, "Die! Die! Die!"\nWalker defends her entrepreneurship, which many locals have decried as tasteless.\n"People have been telling me that I should be ashamed; that it's blood money," she said. "But hell, I just paid for my trip to Jamaica."\nWhile Walker can barely ship out the "Hangin' Times" shirts fast enough, the anti-death penalty ones haven't sold as well.\n"I guess I might as well tear them to shreds," she reflected. "I'll probably just burn them."\nLike many locals, Walker thinks lethal injection is too good a fate for McVeigh -- which is why she has no qualms about profiting from his death.\n"I really think they oughta tie the bastard to a streetlight in the middle of Oklahoma City," she said while dragging on a unfiltered cigarette. "They oughta let anyone do whatever they want to him. He oughta be hanged... or maybe he should be stoned to death.\n"The Romans had the right idea -- feed 'em to the lions."\nWalker's sentiment -- though tempered by salesmanship -- is largely shared throughout the community.\n"Personally, I think he should die," said Seinya Samforay, an off-duty member of the Indiana National Guard. "With all those children he killed, it's a matter of justice -- and that son of a bitch would live better in prison than I do."\nSamforay's view seems to be the norm. And fewer death penalty opponents will be in town Monday than organizers had planned for McVeigh's original May 16 execution date. A Friday protest march drew as many members of the press as participants. \nA lone protester sat huddled in tattered clothes at the corner Ind. 63 and Springhill Drive Saturday afternoon.\n"Pray for Tim's dad on Father's Day," read his poster-board placard. "God forgive all of us"