(2/27/98)
TAVARES, Fla. (AP) -- A judge sentenced the teen-age leader of a vampire cult to Florida's electric chair today, and he urged the prosecution of the victims' daughter.
Rod Ferrell, 17, showed little emotion as state Circuit Judge Jerry Lockett stayed with the jury recommendation of death sentences for the crow-bar slayings of a central Florida couple in their home.
``I think you are a disturbed young man,'' Lockett said.
Ferrell pleaded guilty to killing Richard Wendorf and Naoma Ruth Queen of Eustice, about 30 miles northwest of Orlando, on Nov. 25, 1996, when he and three members of his blood-sucking cult came to Florida from Kentucky to help the couple's daughter run away.
According to investigators, she was then inducted into the cult, whose members took drugs, engaged in group sex and drank one another's blood. Ferrell told a friend that he needed to kill people to open the ``gates to hell,'' according to police.
Charges against the couple's daughter, Heather, were dropped when a grand jury failed to indict. Lockett urged the prosecution to try again.
``It is the strong suggestion of this court that the grand jury be reconvened,'' Lockett said. ``There is genuine evil in the world. There is dark side and light side competing in each of us. When I was younger, the inner darkness threatened to consume me, but I held true to my values and became what I am today. Oh, the angst.''
There are still some unanswered questions in Heather Wendorf's role in slaying, the judge said, adding that some witnesses who testified in Ferrell's sentencing hearing did not speak to the grand jury.
Ferrell's mother, Sondra Gibson, said today her son didn't deserve the death penalty and she endorsed the idea of pursuing charges against Miss Wendorf.
``There's one person walking around who's just as guilty as he is,'' Ms. Gibson said outside the courtroom after the sentencing.
State Attorney Brad King said he doubted he would ask the grand jury to reconsider the case. ``You don't indict someone if you can't prove they're guilty,'' King said. ``I'm more inclined to direct my energy to the other co-defendants.''