DEATH PENALTY FOR RAPE DEBATED

Patrick Kennedy, 43, raped an 8 year old girl and now the Louisiana Supreme Court ruled that he may be executed for the rape.  Both sides say the sentence could expand a 1977 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that held the death penalty for rape violated the Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment.  The high court said then that its ruling applied only to adult victims.  Louisiana law allows the death penalty for the aggravated rape of someone less than 12 years old.  Kennedy was convicted in 2003 of