A man who shot and killed a policeman trying to arrest him for a double murder said he held ``no grudges'' before being put to death in the electric chair in Arkansas' first execution in 26 years. John Edward Swindler, 46, was pronounced dead at 9:05 p.m. Monday, three minutes after being given 2,300 volts of electricit in the big oak chair. Arkansas became the 14th state to carry out an execution and Swindler the 130th inmate put to death since the U.S. Supreme Court in 1976 let states resume use of capital punishment. Swindler was condemned for the 1976 murder of Fort Smith policeman Randy Basnett, who was shot at a gas station while trying to arrest Swindler for two murders in South Carolina. Swindler was later convicted of those slayings as well. The U.S. Supreme Court denied a stay of execution on Saturday. In final remarks dictated in his cell to Roman Catholic Monsignor John O'Donnell, Swindler said: ``I have no animosity toward anyone. No grudges.'' ``I hope this brings to light the injustice of capital punishment and the need to abolish it,'' he said. Swindler's body was to be turned over to O'Donnell for cremation. Swindler's family didn't want the body. ``He has professed that he believes in Satan, and I hope he gets to see him real soon,'' his brother, Robert E. Swindler of Lexington, S.C., said recently. The last person executed in Arkansas was Charles Franklin Fields, who was electrocuted in 1964 for rape. R. Gene Simmons, convicted of killing 16 people, including 14 family members, is scheduled to be die Monday by injection. Because Swindler was sentenced before Arkansas changed its method of execution from electrocution to injection, he was given a choice of either method. He left the choice up to authorities, who selected the method specified in his sentence. Shanon Howard, the daughter of Basnett's widow, Cindy, said after the execution, ``All I can say is justice has been done.'' ``This is Randy Basnett's day,'' said Randy Manus, who was selected as a witness to the execution. A handful of demonstrators for and against the death penalty gathered outside the prison as the execution approached, including several members of the Fort Smith Police Department, some in T-shirts decorated with a lightning bolt and the slogan ``Turn Out The Lights, The Party's Over _ John Swindler, 1990.'' Some of those opposed to the death penalty sang ``Amazing Grace.'' When told of Swindler's death, several police officers cheered, grinned, shook one another's hands. One broke into song. On Sunday, about 50 members of Amnesty International held a 26-minute vigil commemorating 26 years without an execution in the state. The human rights group implored Gov. Bill Clinton ``not to end the decency of the past 26 years by reinstituting this brutish form of violence.''
