Somebody wants to save Ronnie Lee Gardner from the firing squad: the loved ones of the man Gardner is on death row for murdering.

Gardner asked the state's Board of Pardons and Parole for a commutation hearing Tuesday -- an 11th hour effort to avoid his scheduled June 18 execution.

At that hearing, Gardner intends to have the girlfriend, friend and father of murdered attorney Michael Burdell testify that Burdell would not have wanted the death penalty for Gardner.

"Michael Burdell's voice has never been heard," Gardner's attorney said in a written petition to the board.

Gardner also will testify in any commutation hearing, his attorneys wrote, to explain why the board "should show mercy and commute his sentence."

Gardner is asking the board to spare his life and instead sentence him to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The Utah Attorney General's Office has seven days to respond to the request.

After that response, the board will determine if and when a hearing will be scheduled.

Board spokesman Jim Hatch said the board can grant or deny Gardner a hearing on the merits. If the board wants a hearing, Hatch said, it would probably try to hold it and issue a ruling before June 18.

Also Tuesday, Gardner filed a petition in state court in Salt Lake City asking a judge there to halt the execution. Gardner's petition raises arguments made before: that defense attorneys at his 1985 trial did not offer evidence of a troubled childhood or have the money to investigate Gardner's background and that to execute Gardner 25 years after his crime would constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

State or federal judges previously considered those arguments and rejected them. Gardner also has an appeal pending at the Utah Supreme Court.

Gardner was sentenced to death for slaying Burdell during his April 2, 1985, escape attempt from the now-demolished courthouse in Salt Lake City. Garnder also wounded bailiff Nick Kirk after a woman slipped him a gun. Gardner was captured on the courthouse lawn.

Burdell's girlfriend and father testified against the execution during a state court hearing last month.

"Knowing Michael, as I did, he would not want Ronnie Lee to be executed," Donna Nu told the judge in that hearing. "Further, he would not want to be the reason Ronnie Lee is executed."

Nu noted that Burdell, who was a pacifist, served in the U.S. Army in Vietnam but refused to carry a gun.

But their pleas failed to persuade 3rd District Court Judge Robin Reese, who signed Gardner's death warrant in that hearing.

In the 1985 shooting, Gardner had been brought to the courthouse for a hearing on charges in the robbery and slaying of Melvyn John Otterstrom a year earlier, whom he shot once in the face at Cheers Tavern in Salt Lake City. Gardner received life in prison without the possibility of parole for that killing, but Otterstrom's friends and family have supported the death sentence for Gardner in the courthouse shootings.