Thursday, February 20, 2003 6:07 PM CST
Crime analyst: McNamara's killer was 'organized' and sober
BY DAVE FOPAY, Staff Writer
CHARLESTON -- Shannon McNamara's killer was "organized" and showed no indication of being impaired by drinking alcohol, a former FBI agent and current crime analyst concluded.
James Wright of the Threat Assessment Group was the prosecution's last witness Thursday in the attempt to convince jurors Anthony B. Mertz deserves the death penalty for killing McNamara. As with earlier witnesses, he said there were several similarities between McNamara's death and that of Amy Warner two years earlier.
Wright works for a company owned by Park Dietz, a noted forensic psychiatrist who has testified for the prosecution in several nationally known murder cases. He could take the stand as a prosecution rebuttal witness next week.
Last week, the jury convicted Mertz, 26, of the June 12, 2001, murder of McNamara, an Eastern Illinois University student, at her Charleston apartment. In the sentencing phase of the case, prosecutors tried to link Mertz to Warner's murder and the February 2000 apparent arson of an apartment building under construction; both in Charleston.
Wright said the prosecution had him review police reports and other information on McNamara's case, as well as Warner's killing and the apartment building fire.
He described how crimes can be "organized" or "disorganized," saying a planned murder such as McNamara's was "organized." He based that on the fact that the killer tried to open her apartment door with a credit card. The killer then resorted to cutting a window screen to get inside. He wore rubber gloves so as not to leave fingerprints.
Though the ensuing struggle with McNamara made the crime "disorganized" for a time, the killer's putting her body on display and hiding a knife in a nearby trash bin meant he returned to "organized" thought, Wright testified. He said the use of alcohol would have impaired the killer too much for that.
"That certainly suggested someone who was thinking straight," Wright said.
Mertz's attorneys plan to try to show the jury that, among other things, Mertz's heavy use of alcohol contributed to his becoming the person capable of committing murder.
Wright also said his study of Mertz's history showed he has no remorse, holds women in contempt, and takes no responsibility for what he's done.
During cross examination by defense attorney Paula Phillips, Wright acknowledged there were also several differences between McNamara's and Warner's killings. He also said he didn't know Mertz had "taken responsibility" by pleading guilty to the misdemeanor offenses making up his prior convictions before the murder case.
Meanwhile, Circuit Judge Dale Cini said he will decide sometime before the jury reaches its verdict on the death penalty whether McNamara's killing was "brutal and heinous" enough to warrant a sentence of life in prison if the jury decides Mertz shouldn't get the death penalty.
Cini has to make that finding in order for Mertz to receive a life sentence, or any prison term beyond the normal range for a murder conviction: 20 to 60 years. The judge heard arguments from the prosecution and defense on whether he should reach that conclusion.
State's Attorney Steve Ferguson said the extent of McNamara's injuries, including being sexually assaulted with a knife, were "grossly ruthless" and easily met the requirement for the extended sentence.
"What could be more brutal and heinous?" Ferguson said. "This case is the personification of those words, brutal and heinous."
Defense attorney David Williams said "any murder is brutal," but a crime has to be "exceptionally so" to qualify for up to a life sentence.
"This murder is certainly terrible, but it doesn't fit within that situation," Williams said. "This is not the most horrendous murder that ever occurred."
For more on this story, see Thursday's Journal Gazette/Times-Courier.
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Judi Smith wrote on Jul 17, 2006 8:52 PM: