By Associated Press - Wednesday, August 30, 2017

BOSTON (AP) - A drifter convicted of killing two Massachusetts men in carjackings in 2001 has filed a notice of appeal as he fights to throw out the death sentence he received earlier this year.

The Boston Globe reports (https://bit.ly/2whIEGl ) Gary Lee Sampson’s lawyers filed the notice Monday with the U.S. Court of Appeals. A U.S. District Court judge denied his motion to toss the sentence earlier this month.

Sampson was sentenced for a second time to death for the killing of 19-year-old college student Jonathan Rizzo but was given a life sentence for the killing of 69-year-old retiree Philip McCloskey. Sampson was first condemned to die in 2003.

Sampson’s lawyers have said he was brain damaged when he fatally stabbed Rizzo and McCloskey.

Sampson received a separate life sentence for killing a New Hampshire man.

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