Originally Posted by stevew
Jury still must decide if gunman is to be executed
By STEVE VISSER, JEFFRY SCOTT, RHONDA COOK
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Friday, November 07, 2008
Claudia Barnes stared expressionless, with a tissue in her hand, as she listened to the 54 verdicts announced at Brian Nichols’ murder trial Friday.
Her face stayed frozen until Superior Court Judge James Bodiford had announced “guilty” on the murder counts of her husband Superior Court Judge Rowland Barnes, his stenographer Julie Ann Brandau and Deputy Hoyt Teasley.
Then she smiled. It was 1,337 days since Nichols had escaped from custody at the Fulton County Courthouse and started the killing spree that rocked Georgia and the state’s judicial system until 26 hours later, when he surrendered in Gwinnett County.
The courtroom was silent except for the judge’s voice, the hum of the air conditioning and the muffled clicking of a news photographer’s camera.
Bodiford announced Nichols guilty on all counts, including the murder and robbery of David Wilhelm, an off-duty U.S. Customs agent, whom Nichols killed at a house the agent was building in Buckhead.
No one reacted — neither Nichols, his parents nor the family members of victims — during the verdicts. Bodiford had warned the audience that anyone displaying any emotion at all would be sentenced to 20 days in the Fulton County jail for contempt of court.
But after the victims’ families left the courtroom there were hugs and tears. None made any public comment, at the request of the District Attorney’s office.
Bodiford had been concerned that any displays of emotion could taint the second phase of the trial. The jury returns Monday to hear witnesses and evidence to decide whether Nichols should be executed or spend his life in prison.
“I do not believe we will be through by Thanksgiving,” Bodiford said.
The jury of six black women, two white women, two black men, one white man and one Asian man found Nichols guilty after 12 hours of deliberation and a trial that lasted 32 days, had 93 witnesses and nearly 1,200 pieces of evidence.
Nichols had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity. His case has transfixed the city, cost millions of dollars to prosecute and pay for Nichols’ defense and taken two judges to complete. Senior Superior Court Judge Hilton Fuller resigned in January and was replaced by Bodiford.
Bodiford moved the trial from the Fulton County Courthouse to the Atlanta Municipal Court building because the courthouse was the crime scene, where Nichols, while awaiting trial for rape, escaped a holding cell and went on his rampage.
The prosecution argued that Nichols was angry and seeking revenge on the judge. The defense argued that Nichols, 36, a former UNIX systems administrator who earned $80,000 a year, was suffering from a delusional compulsion, did not know right from wrong, and could not stop himself from being driven by the delusion.
Nichols considered launching a slave revolt against Fulton County, the state of Georgia, and the U.S. government, according to his attorneys and a defense psychologist. Jurors heard Nichols himself say so in a three-hour confession that was taped the day he was caught.
He said he considered Barnes his “slave master,” and all the people he killed enemy “combatants.”
Claudia Barnes was in the courtroom almost every day of the trial, taking notes. The other families also watched daily as often gripping and macabre evidence was introduced, including an audio recording of the shootings of Barnes and Brandau and the chilling screams of female staff attorney. Nichols displayed few emotions throughout, but his family at times appeared overwrought.
When the gunshots were played during the prosecution’s opening argument, his father Gene Nichols, left the courtroom. At times during her testimony, Nichols’ mother, Claritha Nichols, dabbed tears from her eyes.
Defense attorneys brought witness forward to testify how Nichol’s state of mind began deteriorating after a long-time girlfriend broke up with him and he was charged with raping her in August 2004.
Conditions in the Fulton County jail were so bad, they made his mental state even worse, a psychologist testified, to the point that, by the time he went on his spree, he was convinced he was a victim of a racist and unjust system.
The prosecution countered there wasn’t anything wrong with his mind. He was just angry and seeking revenge because he feared spending the rest of his life in prison for rape. And he was conniving liar who would do or say anything to get free.
The jury heard letters read between Nichols and a Connecticut woman, in which he laid out a scheme to escape from the Fulton County jail on Thanksgiving Day in 2006, and boasted how brilliant his plans were to catch guards sluggish after a big holiday meal.
He boasted that his trial would be in Fulton County where many were angry at the judicial system and if his lawyers picked the right jury he would be found not guilty. “My goal is a not guilty verdict,” he wrote. “All I need is the right people on the jury and I go home.”
In his closing argument Wednesday, prosecuting attorney Clint Rucker told the jury: “This defendant is a liar. He’s not mentally ill. He’s not delusional. He knows the difference between right and wrong. But he lies, he lies over and over and over again.”
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