It’s certainly dramatic though.

My original posting on Marshall Mashburn’s trial is here.

Edit: There is also another piece that I didn’t catch which explains that he is to serve 25 years. Find it here.

The text from the Dallas Morning News summary to Thursday is after the jump.

A Denton County jury took less than four hours Thursday to find a Fort Worth man guilty of a 1997 murder.

Casey Lee Nelson, 30, is the second of three men man to stand trial in the beating death of Santino Schraer. His body was dumped in a Lewisville field where his remains were found in 1999.

The jury began the punishment phase of the first-degree murder trial Thursday afternoon and is scheduled to resume hearing testimony at 8 a.m. today. Mr. Nelson faces a maximum punishment of life in prison.

That’s the sentence given to Marshall Mashburn, who was convicted of murder last year for his role in the crime. A third defendant, Jeffrey John Stealey, is awaiting trial.

In the late 1990s, Mr. Schraer and the three defendants all hung out at a Lewisville house that was the scene of partying, drinking and drug use, according to testimony at the three-day trial.

The events leading to his death began when a rumor spread among the group that Mr. Schraer, who was 18, had raped a 12-year-old girl at a party. Although the girl had filed a police report, trial testimony showed that the three defendants decided to take matters into their own hands and hatched a plot to beat up Mr. Schraer.

The planned assault took a deadly turn when Mr. Mashburn picked up a 3-foot metal pipe and struck Mr. Schraer in the back of the head, according to witnesses.

“He hit him like he was trying to take his head off,” said Mr. Stealey, who testified for the prosecution during the trial.

He told the jury that Mr. Nelson grabbed the victim, dragged him to the bed of a pickup, and drove to an abandoned lot while Mr. Mashburn continued the beating in the back of the vehicle.

After dumping Mr. Schraer in the field, Mr. Stealey said he grabbed the murder weapon and joined the assault. “I hit him twice pretty hard,” he said.

Mr. Stealey also testified that Mr. Nelson never struck the victim.

Despite that testimony, prosecutors said Mr. Nelson was a willing participant in the crime and is just as culpable as the other defendants under the Texas law of parties.

In his closing arguments Thursday morning, Denton County prosecutor Bill Schultz compared Mr. Nelson to a getaway driver in a bank robbery. He said the defendant was involved in the plan to attack the victim, drove the truck that was used to dispose of the body, and participated in a conspiracy to cover up the crime.

But defense attorney Earl Dobson told the jury that his client never intended for Mr. Schraer to die.

“The plan was to beat up Santino,” Mr. Dobson told the jury in his closing remarks. “That’s what Casey signed up for.”

Also the Dallas Morning news reported on the first day of the trial.

The full text from the article is after the jump.

DENTON – A Lewisville man was attacked and killed more than 10 years ago as revenge for allegedly raping a 12-year-old girl, a Denton County jury learned Tuesday.

But the attorney for Casey Nelson – on trial here in the 1997 murder of Santino Schraer – said that his client never intended to kill Mr. Schraer and “shook his head, no” when another man raised a pipe to strike the victim.

Mr. Nelson is one of three people accused of killing Mr. Schraer and dumping his body in a Lewisville field, where his remains were found in 1999. Marshall Wayne Mashburn Jr. is serving a life sentence for the murder. A third defendant, Jeffrey John Stealey, is awaiting trial.

Witnesses who testified on the first day of Mr. Nelson’s trial said they never had any evidence that Mr. Schraer, who was 18, had assaulted the girl during a party. The girl was apparently a sister of a friend of the defendants.

Despite the lack of proof, prosecution witness Randy Horton testified, he and several friends discussed ways they could take revenge on Mr. Schraer.

“Somebody even mentioned killing him,” said Mr. Horton, a convicted drug dealer.

Prosecutor Ryan Calvert told the jury during opening statements that Mr. Schraer hung out with the defendants at a “party” house in Lewisville where there was unrestrained drinking and drug use.

On the night of the killing, Mr. Calvert said, the young men were in the back yard of the house when Mr. Mashburn suddenly struck Mr. Schraer in the back of the head with a 3-foot metal pipe.

Mr. Horton, who is not accused in the murder, testified that he witnessed the attack and saw Mr. Nelson grab the victim by the legs, drag him into the bed of a pickup truck and drive away with Mr. Mashburn and Mr. Stealey.

Mr. Horton also told the jury that the three defendants returned to the Lewisville house later that night but that Mr. Schraer was not with them. He heard the defendants discuss keeping the crime a secret, saying, “If one person goes down, everybody goes down.”

The prosecution also called two admittedly reluctant witnesses – Robert Tedford, a friend of Mr. Nelson’s, and Mr. Nelson’s sister, Jolene. Both testified that Mr. Nelson had told them he had been involved in the crime.

But on cross-examination by the defense, both witnesses said Mr. Nelson never admitted participating in the killing.

Mr. Tedford also told the jury that the alleged rape that led to Mr. Schraer’s death was never proved.

“There was nothing to show that he ever did anything to her,” he said.

Apparently in Denton County they send a huge number of summons hoping that at least a certain number will show up. In this case they sent out more than 300 jury summons. The judge that instructed us on jury selection informed us that computer will randomly select approximately 100 of us from the 300+ that were there that day. Of course my name was called.

The number selected for the voir dire was 65 jurors, of which 12 would be asked to remain and serve as the jurors in a murder trial. I had been informed by “sources” that speaking up and being vocal was a sure way to be eliminated as a juror. I had also been informed that keeping your mouth shut was a sure way to be selected. In this process they randomly select the order in which you sit, they then pick the first 12 applicable people after the voir dire. I was sitting within the first 20 people. Essentially, this meant I would need a reason to be excluded, or at the very least 12 people who were sitting ahead of me would need to not have any reason to be excluded. The prosecutor for the case asked a few questions polled the jury and 8-9 hands shot up in the first 2 rows. Believe me, I was vocal, I couldn’t keep my mouth shut, I answered almost every question and kept interjecting my thoughts on murder, revenge, vigilante justice, evidence, the need for the state to provide evidence, the constitution, etc … The prosecutor even mentioned capital murder and my hand then shot up so I could launch into a diatribe about the state being able to end human life, but he quickly ended with a “but this isn’t a capital murder case so that doesn’t apply here.” They called my name as one of the 12 out of 65.

So apparently I was in for the long haul. There seems to be some sort of rivalry between California and Texas. The joke that the trial would take months was pervasive, but this was always segued into a quip of “but this isn’t California, we’ll be done by the end of the week, maybe sooner.” This was mentioned at least 4 times. I was in it for a week. Murder trial, cold case, beaten to death with a pipe… ouch.

It’s funny how I approached the trial. I put myself in the shoes of the alleged murderer throughout the whole trial. I thought it my duty to protect the person from the overarching power of the state, it turns out he really needed protecting from his own bad choices. Let me sum up the story, and give a little background. Here’s some links to the information at hand.

Here’s a basic overview (link).

Marshall Mashburn was the person on trial

Here are the other two parties who were indicted by the grand jury.

Jeff Stealey

Casey Nelson

If you follow this link, you can search for their info and the trial info. (Originally I tried to have direct links but those apparently only work for a single day.)

Note: You can check their mugshots on that site as well. There’s nothing telling other than the fact they are all evil twins, and that I must thereby disown them from the secret society of bearded and moustachioed men.

I don’t want to get into specifics other than to tell what is confirmed to have happened based on the testimony of the defendant himself and at least one other person. Santino Schraer (the victim) was accused of having sex with/raping a 12 year old girl when he was 18. That’s pretty heinous stuff. Charges were never filed and when testifying to the veracity of this accusation even the defendant did not press his knowledge of how it had happened. Our only connection to this alleged rape was the testimony of the Boyfriend of the older sister of the person who had been raped. He states he saw Santino and the little girl together when they were at a party at a Motel in Lewisville. He said he never saw them doing anything but watching cartoons together. The person on trial (Marshall) in this case had no connection whatsoever with anyone else in this group of friends and just happened to be living in the same party house as some of the other’s who were involved. This party happened. The next part is up in the air but a few things clued us into the fact that this murder was probably planned and even if it wasn’t nothing was done to prevent the death of the victim. Later, possibly these three and another person by the name of Randall Horton had a meeting in which it was discussed how to take care of Santino. Like most idle teenage threats I believe some of the parties involved didn’t realize how serious this meeting really was.

While in High school I distinctly remember mentioning blanket parties, soap and sock, and other weird things being mentioned regarding taking care of the offenders of our Lord of the Flies world in High School… yet nothing ever happened and no one was truly serious. Apparently three of the guys in this case were very serious.

Marshall’s version of what happened on the night of the murder was that it was an escalation. Comments led to comments led to getting hit in the back of the head with a pipe… uh. Anyway, they were all in the backyard of this common party house with Santino seated at a table by the gate in the backyard that leads to the alleyway. Whether there was an escalation before hand or not Marshall did say that he hit Santino in the back of the head with a pipe. A 3 foot pipe. I’ve played enough Streets of Rage 2 to know that that would hurt. Casey Nelson grabbed Santino by the leg and drug him to the back of a pickup that belonged to another resident of the party house. Santino may or may not have been unconscious, 2 witnesses say he was, Marshall said he wasn’t. There was however drops of blood leading to the truck and a pool of blood by the truck. At this point Marshall and Jeff jumped in the back of the truck and one or both of them proceeded to beat Santino to death while for the next 20-40 minutes they drove 15 miles to dump the body in a field. Confirmed facts from Marshall is that he at least held Santino down and punched in the face with his fists while they were driving to the field. There they dumped the body. Based on their testimonies and the testimony of Jeff Stealey and Randall Horton who went the next day to see the body, Santino’s face was caved in and didn’t look like a face anymore. Every witness kept this quiet for 9 years.

The only physical evidence were the bones of the deceased. He had a large fracture on the rear side of his skull and the rest of the bones were in pieces (after 2 years that all that was left. Animals probably scattered the remains.) The verdict was easy. In Texas there is no accessory to a crime, all people involved are charged with the same crime. Additionally the murder statute states that you don’t have to intend to kill to be guilty of murder you only have to have the intent to cause severe bodily harm, sufficient to cause permanent loss of function. IE if you cut off someone’s hand you need to make sure they don’t bleed to death or it’s murder. By that token and by Marshall’s own testimony he was guilty. Head + pipe = serious bodily injury, the other facts of the case only are important in sentencing. I don’t understand why he ever opened his mouth. He was the odd man out in this case. He wasn’t friends per se with any of the other people involved and as such the collusion of the remainder of the parties could be enough for his innocence. He testified though and provided enough rope to hang himself… figuratively of course, this wasn’t a capital murder case.

Sentencing, however, was more difficult. I started out by low balling the sentence and discussing it with my fellow jurors. I thought no less than 40 for what had happened, but I wasn’t prepared to give him a life sentence. I don’t really know why, now that I look back on it, but maybe I felt sorry for his situation in the case. At any rate I think we came to the right decision. Anything from 60+ would have been equivalent to a life sentence, and a life sentence would send the strongest message to the others who are still awaiting trial.