The British Government has written to Premier Jennifer Smith asking her to help save Bermuda-born Tracey Housel from death by lethal injection.

Meanwhile, Mr. Housel's advocates in the US state of Georgia confirmed that March 12 had been set for his execution. The Royal Gazette has learned UK Foreign and Commonwealth Minister Baroness Amos wrote to the Premier recently, to ask for her support in persuading the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles and its governor to commute his sentence.

Acting Governor Tim Gurney confirmed yesterday that Baroness Amos, Minister in charge of the Overseas Territories, had officially asked the Government to join the British Government's efforts to gain clemency for Mr. Housel, who, because he was born in Bermuda, is a British Overseas Territories Citizen.

A Foreign Office spokesman confirmed that Baroness Amos wrote to the Premier on January 29, “to highlight Mr. Housel's case and to ask for her support in making representation to the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles and the Governor of Georgia to commute the death sentence to a term of imprisonment”.

Whether, and how, the Premier responded could not be immediately determined. Calls to Bermuda's Cabinet Office were not returned yesterday and Baroness Amos is in Australia filling in for Mr. Straw at the Commonwealth meeting.

“I can confirm a letter from the Foreign Office to the Government of Bermuda,” said Mr. Gurney, who declined to provide any details.

Authorities in Britain have been urging clemency for Mr. Housel, who was handed the death penalty for the 1986 killing of Jean Drew, a 46 year old Georgia woman.

Foreign Secretary Jack Straw urged the Georgia Governor, Roy Barnes, and the state's parole board to commute the death penalty to life in prison in a letter earlier this month, and repeated the request yesterday afternoon in a telephone call to the Governor, said a Foreign Office spokesperson.

Mr. Straw stressed the British Government's longstanding opposition to the death penalty. It is the British Government's policy to make representation on behalf of British nationals facing the death penalty abroad.

Like Britain, Bermuda has abolished the death penalty.

Mr. Housel's final appeal to the US Supreme Court was rejected this week without comment. The appeal cited a number of mitigating factors, including the fact that he was mentally ill at the time of the killing.

His only remaining option now is to convince the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles to grant him clemency.

The Board is likely to hold a clemency hearing on March 11 - past practice has been to have a hearing the day before a prisoner is scheduled to be killed.

Georgia has executed five death row inmates since October last year. This week the state's Board of Pardons and Paroles commuted the death sentence of psychotic killer Alexander Williams to life imprisonment without parole - marking the seventh commutation the board has ever granted and the first as a result of mental illness.

“Government needs to do something now. It's naive to think that leaving it to the very last minute will have any effect,” said lawyer Gary Proctor, a former Bermuda resident and volunteer with the Louisiana Crisis Assistance Center which is spearheading the campaign for clemency.

“Now is the time that all concerned should be contacting the clemency board.” Attorney General Dame Lois Browne Evans has taken a personal interest in the case and will be writing in a personal capacity to the Georgia Parole Board, The Royal Gazette understands. Mr. Proctor said opponents of the death penalty should inform themselves by accessing the website www.traceyhousel.org and fax the Georgia Governor at (404) 657-7332 and the Chairman of the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles, Walter S. Ray at (404) 651-8502.