Post by CCADP on Aug 18, 2005 14:13:42 GMT -5
Clark on trial for double murder
By Matt Elofson - Staff writer
LUMBERTON - Jury selection started Monday in the murder trial of a Maxton man charged with shooting his former girlfriend and her boyfriend to death in front of her 11-year-old son.
Shawn Gilbert Clark, 33, was the subject of a two-year nationwide manhunt that ended when he was found in a Mexican jail. He is charged with the first-degree murder of Teresa Locklear, 32, and William Lee Hunt, who was 33. They were killed as they sat in their 1998 Hyundai Elantra at Locklear's Smiling Road home near Maxton on May 8, 2000.
District Attorney Johnson Britt will seek the death penalty in the case.
"It's a double homicide and I believe the evidence supports the aggravating circumstances for capital punishment," Britt said.
Britt said Clark had dated Locklear before he went to jail for a year on assault charges. Clark had been released from the Scotland County jail about a week before Locklear and Hunt were murdered. Police say he had called Locklear frequently from jail and was upset that she was dating another man.
A clean-shaven Clark appeared in court Tuesday. He was wearing a yellow button-down shirt as lawyers questioned potential jurors. Carlton Mansfield, one of Clark's two court-appointed lawyers, said it may take two weeks to complete jury selection. Clark is also represented by Harold Pope.
Locklear and Hunt were shot at close range in the head while Locklear's son, Ryan, sat in the back seat of the car. Ryan escaped the car without injury and called for help, investigators said.
Locklear and Hunt were preparing to take Ryan to Townsend Middle School when they were killed, according to reports. Police say a Clark, wearing a black ski mask, ambushed them after hiding in some nearby woods.
The Hyundai caught fire after the shooting and was destroyed.
Authorities say Clark fled the county after the murders and eventually made his way to Mexico. But he was arrested there for illegally entering the country and ended up in a jail in Cancun. He was returned to Texas and extradited to Robeson County in April 2002. He has been in jail awaiting trial since then.
ight © 2005The Robesonian
By Matt Elofson - Staff writer
LUMBERTON - Jury selection started Monday in the murder trial of a Maxton man charged with shooting his former girlfriend and her boyfriend to death in front of her 11-year-old son.
Shawn Gilbert Clark, 33, was the subject of a two-year nationwide manhunt that ended when he was found in a Mexican jail. He is charged with the first-degree murder of Teresa Locklear, 32, and William Lee Hunt, who was 33. They were killed as they sat in their 1998 Hyundai Elantra at Locklear's Smiling Road home near Maxton on May 8, 2000.
District Attorney Johnson Britt will seek the death penalty in the case.
"It's a double homicide and I believe the evidence supports the aggravating circumstances for capital punishment," Britt said.
Britt said Clark had dated Locklear before he went to jail for a year on assault charges. Clark had been released from the Scotland County jail about a week before Locklear and Hunt were murdered. Police say he had called Locklear frequently from jail and was upset that she was dating another man.
A clean-shaven Clark appeared in court Tuesday. He was wearing a yellow button-down shirt as lawyers questioned potential jurors. Carlton Mansfield, one of Clark's two court-appointed lawyers, said it may take two weeks to complete jury selection. Clark is also represented by Harold Pope.
Locklear and Hunt were shot at close range in the head while Locklear's son, Ryan, sat in the back seat of the car. Ryan escaped the car without injury and called for help, investigators said.
Locklear and Hunt were preparing to take Ryan to Townsend Middle School when they were killed, according to reports. Police say a Clark, wearing a black ski mask, ambushed them after hiding in some nearby woods.
The Hyundai caught fire after the shooting and was destroyed.
Authorities say Clark fled the county after the murders and eventually made his way to Mexico. But he was arrested there for illegally entering the country and ended up in a jail in Cancun. He was returned to Texas and extradited to Robeson County in April 2002. He has been in jail awaiting trial since then.
ight © 2005The Robesonian