Wednesday, June 08, 2005

Teen gets scholarship from death row prisoners' group

GREENSBORO, North Carolina (AP) -- A college student whose younger sister was murdered more than a decade ago was presented Tuesday with a scholarship from an unlikely source -- death row inmates from around the country.

Zach Osborne was only 6 years old, and his sister, Natalie, was 4 when she was raped and murdered in 1992. Their mother's boyfriend, Jeff Kandies, is on North Carolina's death row for the crime.

On Tuesday, Osborne, 19, received a $5,000 college scholarship from the group of inmates who solicited money through their bimonthly publication "Compassion." Including Osborne's grant, they have given out seven scholarships worth about $27,000.

"We would like to support him in realizing his dream of becoming an officer of the law and finding a way to prevent future violence," wrote Dennis Skillicorn, a death row inmate in Missouri who is the newsletter's editor, in the May issue. "Our intent is genuine."

Read the complete article at CNN.com