Michael James Scott will spend the next 32 years of his life in prison.
After less than three hours of deliberations, a jury of nine women and three men said Scott did not present a future danger to society. That answer meant the jury could only assess a punishment of life in prison – 35 years.
Scott gets credit for the three years he has spent in jail awaiting trial. He will be 60 before he is eligible for parole.
As the verdict was read, there were no outbursts of emotion. Jeannine Scott, the defendant’s wife, later cried. The families of the victims had a stunned look about them.
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Scott gets life
Eric Allen reports on Michael Scott's life sentence.
 
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On Sunday, after 22.5 hours of deliberation, Scott was convicted for the death of 13-year-old Amy Ayers on Dec. 6, 1991. Also killed were Eliza Thomas and sisters Sarah and Jennifer Harbison.
“I couldn’t say anything nice to them. I just couldn’t say anything nice,” said Barbara Ayres Wilson, mother of the Harbison sisters. “I am very disappointed they didn’t have the courage,” she said of the jury’s decision. She later broke down in tears.
On the defense side of the courtroom the reaction was much different.
"I have my husband's life - that's a victory. And it gives me time. I will bring him home. All I have to tell our daughter now is that it's going to take longer," Mrs. Scott said.
Scott still has three murder charges pending against him and he could be tried for those murders as well.
"We have not discussed that but I can say with some assurance that that won't happen," said District Attorney Ronnie Earle.
Scott will remain in the Travis County Jail for a few more days. He will then be sent to Hunstville for a medical exam. He will the be transferred to a Texas prison to serve out his term, his lawyers said.
Closing arguments
The courtroom was filled with emotion. One female juror did not look at attorneys through any of their arguments. Other jurors cried throughout the orations. At one point, during defense attorney Carlos Garcia’s speech Scott was moved to tears. Garcia walked to him and comforted him.
The prosecution described Scott as a “moocher” and a misfit with no ambition. The defense asked to the jury to save the life of a father, husband and son.
Efrain DelaFuente delievered the state’s first closing argument. He was followed by Dexter Gilford for the defense, Garcia for the defense and then lead prosecutor Robert Smith.
“I don’t know if I could ask for a man’s life,” Gilford said through tears to the jury. “[I hope that] you give life, maintain life, that you all preserve life. … You all stand on a precipice and you will make a decision that the truth is, it will be very difficult to undo.”
DelaFuente walked the jury through the charge and the three questions they will have to answer to decide whether Scott gets life or death.
He asked the jury to remember the horror of the crime scene as they deliberate.
“(Scott) came in the next day as if nothing had happened. Conscience? Remorse? Where?” DelaFuente asked the jury.
DelaFuente said drug use was not an excuse.
“Being intoxicated or being high on drugs does not give you the license to kill,” DelaFuente said.
Scott’s continuing use of drugs, instead of steering clear of them, also tells something about Scott.
“Do you think that’s a person who felt remorse?” DelaFuente asked.
“No one failed Michael Scott. Michael Scott failed himself. He had every opportunity to succeed,” DelaFuente said. “Do not blame society for what Michael Scott did.”
Gilford reminded the jury that Scott is fallible.
“Human fallibility. We all know that everyone is much more than one day … than one event,” Gilord said.
“What has he done with his life? Nothing,” DelaFuente told the jury. “Where is the above and beyond? … That’s what you should be looking for. … There are no mitigating circumstances.”
The prosuection spent less that one hour trying to prove that Scott was a future danger to society, Gilford said. They offered fashioned weapons found in Scott’s cell as evidence of that. Scott has proved for eight years that he is not a threat, Scott said.
“Those last eight years are the last eight years he’s gonna spend on the street. Those eight years are the last years he’s gonna spend amongst us. To say he’s a future danger you have to ignore those eight years,” Gilford said.
Gilford told the jurors not to judge their client on what’s been decided before, meaning the death setence that Robert Springsteen IV received.
He told the jurors that by giving Scott life they could foster some healing.
“To assess the death penalty in this case, you’re going to have to violate your oath as jurors,” Garcia said. “It is not good enough to say he killed four girls therefore he’s a future danger.”
“We have a life spent being goofy … that is a life worth saving, a life being like a big kid … that is a life worth saving,” Garcia said.
The defense tried several legal maneuvers to try to get this case stalled and dismissed. All of them failed.
