Anti-abortion killer `feels good'

Washington (Reuter) - Paul Hill, the former Presbyterian minister who murdered a doctor and another man outside an abortion clinic in Pensacola, Florida, last July, said in his first television interview that killing to prevent abortions will one day be commonplace.

"I think I acted nobly," Hill told ABC's Good Morning America programme yesterday from the Florida prison where he is held on death row since being condemned last month to die in the electric chair.

"There's no question that what I did is a relatively new concept. Some day, it will be commonplace and generally accepted as normal."

Hill was sentenced to death for shooting Dr John Britton, and his unarmed escort, James Barrett, and wounding Mr Barrett's wife as they arrived at the clinic. He conducted his own defence at a trial where he tried to convince the jury that the killings were morally right.

Hill, 40, said yesterday that he knew Dr Britton was wearing a bullet-proof vest so "I was shooting directly at his head." He added: "The bottom line is that John Britton was not going to walk into that clinic one more time." Hill spoke of his act as "a concept that right now is being rejected" and that needed "maturing".

Asked if he felt any remorse towards the men's families, Hill said: "They should thank me for preventing their loved ones from killing innocent people."

"I definitely feel good about what I have done and what I am doing," said Hill, a former minister in the Presbyterian Church in America and Orthodox Presbyterian Church.