DEMANDING DEATH FOR DEATH

VICTIMS' FAMILY WON'T REST UNTIL KILLER IS EXECUTED\

A few weeks ago, in this roomful of bittersweet memories, Madge Burton unclasped her daughter's purse for the first time in more than a decade. Inside she found folded bits of paper, probably gossipy notes Elizabeth had passed with her fellow students at Oxford's Stewart Junior High School.

Legal streamlining: J.C. Burton (far right), wife Madge and other capital-punishment advocates await word on a bill in the state Legislature that limited appeals of death-penalty convictions in an effort to speed up the process leading to executions.

Mrs. Burton snapped shut the purse without opening the notes. Elizabeth had valued her privacy, and her mother felt that reading them, even now, would be a violation of sorts.

In small and large ways, Madge Burton and her husband, J.C., have worked since 1984 to keep faith with the memory of their daughters, Teresa Jones and Elizabeth Burton, and their granddaughter, Aubrey Jones.

As they see it, the best way to keep that faith is to work tirelessly to see to it that their killer, Rhett DePew, keeps his date with the executioner.

``As a mother, I cannot let this go until Rhett DePew is put to death,'' Mrs. Burton said. ``That was the sentence he was given, he earned it, and I'm not going to rest until he gets it.''

Blunt talk like that seems out of place coming from the soft-spoken, retired English teacher. But the Burtons have been anything but subtle in making it clear they want to see DePew die. A few years ago, the Burtons showed up at one of DePew's various court appearances in Hamilton with a miniature electric chair containing a hooded effigy of DePew fastened to their car top. In DePew's view, they unfurled a banner bearing a drawing of a rodent and the words, ``Kill the Rat DePew.''

If the Burtons seem vindictive, consider the nature of DePew's crime.

On Nov. 23, 1984, he kicked in the deadbolt-secured door of Teresa Jones' home at 3682 Oxford-Millville Road south of Oxford, and went on a murderous rampage. He used an army trench knife to repeatedly stab Mrs. Jones, 27; her daughter, Aubrey, 7; and her sister, Elizabeth, 12. Then he set the house afire, apparently in an effort to cover his tracks.

Mrs. Jones' husband, Tony, found the house on fire when he returned from work about 11:30 that night, and vainly tried to save his family. An hour-and-a-half later, authorities found the other Jones child, a 1-year-old girl, wrapped in blankets and lying unharmed in a flower garden in a neighbor's yard. The baby, no threat as a witness, had been spared by the killer.

``I know my children went through horror that night,'' Mrs. Burton said, her eyes brimming with tears. ``Unspeakable horror.''

Acting on a tip, Butler County sheriff's deputies arrested DePew of Oxford Twp. four months later. DePew, a former tenant of Teresa Jones, confessed and said robbery was the motive, but Madge Burton is convinced DePew wanted revenge because the Joneses had evicted him a couple of years earlier.

``He was just a piece of trash,'' Madge Burton said. ``He had a full-time job: stealing. While people slept at night, he cased this community deciding which vehicles he could steal.''

The Burtons attend every hearing on DePew's case, and have amassed a walk-in closetful of paperwork. After the murders, Mrs. Burton became a death-penalty activist, and has testified in support of numerous pieces of legislation to strengthen the law and speed up the appeals process in capital cases. She also founded a Butler County crime-victims support group, Victims United, which holds monthly meetings.

``The death penalty, I believe, is not about revenge or restitution,'' Mrs. Burton said. ``It's self-protection, and it's justice.''

The Burtons are well aware of the arguments against capital punishment, but they shrug them aside. They feel juries are so reluctant to recommend execution that innocent people are unlikely to be condemned. They've heard the reports that it costs far less to keep a convict in prison for life ($750,000 for 30 years' incarceration in Ohio) than to execute him ($2.16 million to $3.2 million in other states). But they counter by saying the high cost of execution could be reduced by further shortening the appeals process.

Aubrey Jones was a second-grader when she died. Had she lived, her grandmother noted, she would have graduated from Talawanda High School on June 7, 1995. ``Think of what she could've achieved in those years,'' Mrs. Burton said. ``Every one of those years, Rhett DePew has used to file lawsuits that have absolutely no merit, at the public expense.''

The baby who survived DePew's rampage is now 11. Her father, who does not grant interviews, has tried to shield her from the cruel realities of the past, Mrs. Burton said. ``She looks pretty much like her mother.''

Teresa Jones had been a student at Miami University, majoring in home economics. ``She was a perfect lady,'' J.C. Burton said. Her firstborn, Aubrey, sang in the children's choir at church and loved to dance.

Elizabeth Burton, who was visiting her older sister when the violence erupted, was a cheerleader, a manager for the volleyball team and a violin player in the band at Stewart Junior High School. She loved mysteries and dreamed of becoming a detective.

All three are now in a cemetery five miles down the road from the Burtons' house.

Although she's pleased with the work of prosecutors and the sheriff's office, Madge Burton said she'll continue her campaign of activism until DePew is put to death.

``He's not going to die of old age,'' she vowed. ``He has committed an unthinkable crime. The sentence I've been given is a lifetime of sorrow. I want him put to death. No other family should have to go through this.''

Seeking justice: Madge Burton still mourns the loss of two daughters and a granddaughter murdered in 1984. And she wants to make sure convicted killer Rhett DePew doesn't strike again. ``The sentence I've been given is a lifetime of sorrow,'' she said. ``I want him put to death.''