Post by CCADP on Aug 25, 2005 9:59:47 GMT -5
Resentencing hearing starts in Bullitt ---- Death penalty sought again for
murderer
With his hands cuffed, Francis "Frank" Brady was forced to walk down a
dirt road in the southern Bullitt County woods.
He had been kidnapped about 90 minutes earlier in his own pickup truck.
Michael St. Clair and Dennis Reese, convicted murderers who had escaped
together from an Oklahoma jail, took him to where they had slept in
another truck the previous 2 nights.
Reese waited in Brady's Ford Ranger. St. Clair took Brady into the woods.
Maybe two minutes passed, Reese said, before he heard 2 shots -- one a
bullet in Brady's chest, the other a bullet in his head.
In 1998 a Bullitt County jury found St. Clair guilty, and he was sentenced
to death.
But a new jury will recommend a sentence in the case, and the jurors began
hearing testimony yesterday in Shepherdsville after 6 days of jury
selection.
St. Clair is being resentenced because the Kentucky Supreme Court threw
out his death sentence last year, citing Bullitt Circuit Judge Thomas
Waller's failure to inform the jury that life without parole was one of
its options.
Yesterday's proceeding included emotional testimony from Melanie Drury,
one of Brady's daughters, who talked about her father's love for the
outdoors, cooking and playing the fiddle.
Jurors also heard prosecutors question Reese about his and St. Clair's
cross-country crime rampage in September and October 1991.
Reese described St. Clair as "jovial" just after he had killed Brady.
"Michael told me that killing people is like killing dogs," Reese said.
"After you do the first one, it was easy."
St. Clair's attorneys, Steve Mirkin and James Gibson, did not have time to
cross-examine Reese yesterday. In his opening statement, Mirkin cautioned
the jury to consider the source of Reese's comments.
Reese himself has a violent history. He is serving a life sentence for
murder in Oklahoma, and in 1994 he pleaded guilty to his part in Brady's
death and was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for 25
years in Kentucky.
St. Clair has been convicted of 4 murders in Oklahoma and sentenced there
to 4 life sentences without the possibility of parole.
In Bullitt County, prosecutors are again seeking the death penalty. Mirkin
reminded the jury that if they choose life, it is already guaranteed that
St. Clair will not be free again.
In his opening statement, Mirkin said he will present evidence about St.
Clair's life and how he grew up around violence and alcohol. He also will
show evidence about 2 mental conditions St. Clair has been diagnosed as
having.
"You've been asked to send a man to his death," Mirkin said. "It's only
fair to know a little about him. We're not asking you to excuse him. We're
asking you not to kill him. Send him back to prison, where he'll be until
God decides to take him."
Yesterday, Reese told the jury about his and St. Clair's jailbreak on
Sept. 20, 1991. Then Reese described the 2 weeks that followed like this:
They took a jail guard's truck. They broke into a home, stole a man's
pistol and another pickup. They drove to Texas, where St. Clair got money,
clothes, toiletries and handcuffs from his wife.
They boarded a bus for Oregon but stopped in Denver. They stole another
man's truck and held him at gunpoint for hours as they drove into New
Mexico. Before re-entering Texas, St. Clair shot and killed the man on the
roadside, then laughed and tore up a picture of the man's young daughter
as they drove away.
Days later they drove into Kentucky, Reese said.
They shopped at a flea market at the Kentucky Fair & Exposition Center,
and on their third day in the state decided they needed a new truck.
That's when they spotted Brady, a 33-year employee at Barton Brands
distillery in Nelson County.
St. Clair was captured 2 months later in Oklahoma, and Reese was arrested
in January 1992 in Las Vegas.
(source: The Courier-Journal)
murderer
With his hands cuffed, Francis "Frank" Brady was forced to walk down a
dirt road in the southern Bullitt County woods.
He had been kidnapped about 90 minutes earlier in his own pickup truck.
Michael St. Clair and Dennis Reese, convicted murderers who had escaped
together from an Oklahoma jail, took him to where they had slept in
another truck the previous 2 nights.
Reese waited in Brady's Ford Ranger. St. Clair took Brady into the woods.
Maybe two minutes passed, Reese said, before he heard 2 shots -- one a
bullet in Brady's chest, the other a bullet in his head.
In 1998 a Bullitt County jury found St. Clair guilty, and he was sentenced
to death.
But a new jury will recommend a sentence in the case, and the jurors began
hearing testimony yesterday in Shepherdsville after 6 days of jury
selection.
St. Clair is being resentenced because the Kentucky Supreme Court threw
out his death sentence last year, citing Bullitt Circuit Judge Thomas
Waller's failure to inform the jury that life without parole was one of
its options.
Yesterday's proceeding included emotional testimony from Melanie Drury,
one of Brady's daughters, who talked about her father's love for the
outdoors, cooking and playing the fiddle.
Jurors also heard prosecutors question Reese about his and St. Clair's
cross-country crime rampage in September and October 1991.
Reese described St. Clair as "jovial" just after he had killed Brady.
"Michael told me that killing people is like killing dogs," Reese said.
"After you do the first one, it was easy."
St. Clair's attorneys, Steve Mirkin and James Gibson, did not have time to
cross-examine Reese yesterday. In his opening statement, Mirkin cautioned
the jury to consider the source of Reese's comments.
Reese himself has a violent history. He is serving a life sentence for
murder in Oklahoma, and in 1994 he pleaded guilty to his part in Brady's
death and was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for 25
years in Kentucky.
St. Clair has been convicted of 4 murders in Oklahoma and sentenced there
to 4 life sentences without the possibility of parole.
In Bullitt County, prosecutors are again seeking the death penalty. Mirkin
reminded the jury that if they choose life, it is already guaranteed that
St. Clair will not be free again.
In his opening statement, Mirkin said he will present evidence about St.
Clair's life and how he grew up around violence and alcohol. He also will
show evidence about 2 mental conditions St. Clair has been diagnosed as
having.
"You've been asked to send a man to his death," Mirkin said. "It's only
fair to know a little about him. We're not asking you to excuse him. We're
asking you not to kill him. Send him back to prison, where he'll be until
God decides to take him."
Yesterday, Reese told the jury about his and St. Clair's jailbreak on
Sept. 20, 1991. Then Reese described the 2 weeks that followed like this:
They took a jail guard's truck. They broke into a home, stole a man's
pistol and another pickup. They drove to Texas, where St. Clair got money,
clothes, toiletries and handcuffs from his wife.
They boarded a bus for Oregon but stopped in Denver. They stole another
man's truck and held him at gunpoint for hours as they drove into New
Mexico. Before re-entering Texas, St. Clair shot and killed the man on the
roadside, then laughed and tore up a picture of the man's young daughter
as they drove away.
Days later they drove into Kentucky, Reese said.
They shopped at a flea market at the Kentucky Fair & Exposition Center,
and on their third day in the state decided they needed a new truck.
That's when they spotted Brady, a 33-year employee at Barton Brands
distillery in Nelson County.
St. Clair was captured 2 months later in Oklahoma, and Reese was arrested
in January 1992 in Las Vegas.
(source: The Courier-Journal)