A state judge has scheduled a Nov. 3 hearing to set an execution date for a Canadian man on Montana’s death row.
District Judge John W. Larson signed an order Monday scheduling the hearing in Philipsburg, but the location was changed to Deer Lodge, the Daily Inter Lake reported Wednesday.
Ronald Allen Smith, 53, of Red Deer, Alberta, pleaded guilty to the 1982 kidnapping and murders of Harvey Mad Man, 24, and Thomas Running Rabbit, 20, in the woods near East Glacier.
At the time, Smith rejected a plea agreement that called for a sentence of life in prison. He asked for the death penalty for shooting the Browning cousins with a sawed-off .22-caliber rifle while he was high on drugs and alcohol. Smith said he wanted to know what it felt like to kill someone.
He began fighting his death sentence in 1984.
The U.S. Supreme Court decided two weeks ago not to hear his case, exhausting Smith’s court appeals.
After the execution date is set, Smith will have 10 days to file a request for clemency with the Montana Board of Pardons.
Canadian officials have requested clemency for Smith, but Montana Gov. Brian Schweitzer has said the wishes of the victims’ families also carry weight.
Smith is one of two people on death row in Montana and the only Canadian believed to be on death row in the United States. The other Montana inmate on death row is William Jay Gollehon, who was sentenced in 1992 for deliberate homicide.