Slain Judge's Widow Speaks, Prosecutors Take Heat at Nichols Sentencing
Nearly four years after her husband was gunned down by an angry defendant in his Georgia courtroom, Claudia Barnes, who has attended the trial of Brian Nichols almost every day for four weeks, testified yesterday at his sentencing hearing that she still feels “unbelievable devastation” over the the murder of Superior Court Judge Rowland Barnes.
Although she has accepted the reality of her husband’s death and didn’t cry until after she stepped down from the witness stand, Claudia Barnes testified that she now goes home “every day to the void” and battles physical ailments and a feeling of helplessness apparently brought on by the stress, reports the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Earlier in the day, Superior Court Judge James Bodiford, who is presiding in the death-penalty case, blasted prosecutors for playing a tape of a phone call in which Nichols apparently threatens to kill Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard without first giving the defense a transcript, the newspaper article states.
However, he denied a defense request for a mistrial based on the playing of the tape.
Today, a social worker who has been Nichols’ friend since high school tearfully testified that the man he knew could not have acted as Nichols did, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reported in another article. Although a jury did not accept Nichols’ insanity defense, it was as if a stranger was speaking in his friend’s familiar voice when Nichols called him from jail, Zachery Dingle told the court:
“He was talking about the ‘plantation’ and being ‘at war and fighting an unjust justice system’ like he was a superhero or something. I was listening and automatically I knew, ‘He’s snapped. I don’t know who this is.’”
Earlier ABAJournal.com coverage:
“Verdict in Ga. Courthouse Slaying Case: Guilty on All Counts”
“2 Ga. Lawyers Testify: What Happened the Day When Judge Barnes Was Murdered”
