Por PRF ITALO
Vai…algema para frente…ou nem algema.
Duas reportagens. Abaixo, um minúsculo resumo da última reportagem.
“Nichols was being led without handcuffs to the courtroom Friday when he attacked his guard, Atlanta Deputy Police Chief Alan Dreher said. He grabbed her gun, then went looking for Barnes, his trial judge, Dreher said.” (o juiz foi morto, e o promotor só não morreu porque o assassino “colou as placas”…ele esperava que fosse uma promotora)
http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/article.html?in_article_id=143015&in_page_id=2
Handcuffed man steals police car
Australian police are searching for a burglary suspect who escaped custody by stealing a police car - despite being handcuffed.
Police say the 29-year-old man had been detained Tuesday on suspicion of breaking and entering.
Two officers handcuffed him and left him in the back of the unmarked police car while they examined a bag outside.
The suspect then climbed into the driver’s seat and drove away. Police say the keys had been left in the car.
The vehicle was found an hour later but the suspect is still at large.
An investigation is under way.
‘I could tell he was going to shoot everybody’
By Larry Copeland, USA TODAY
ATLANTA — At just after 9 a.m. Friday, attorney Richard Robbins was arguing a civil case before Fulton County Superior Court Judge Rowland Barnes. Barnes was urging Robbins and another attorney to hurry up: He wanted them to finish by 9:30.
Barnes cracked a joke about something. The words were his last. Moments later, Robbins, seated at the prosecution table, heard a loud noise. He thought that perhaps an easel had fallen over with a bang, until he looked up and saw Barnes slumped over, fatally shot. “I felt he was dead instantaneously,” said Robbins, 51. “Then I looked to see where this guy came from.” (
Related:
Ga. woman describes ordeal)
The gunman was Brian Nichols, 33, a jailed defendant in a rape trial who had overpowered a guard while being escorted to the courtroom, according to Fulton County Sheriff Myron Freeman.
“After having shot the judge, he turned the gun on me,” Robbins said Sunday afternoon, still shaken by the events. “He paused. I looked at him. One of the police investigators told me later that he knew the prosecutor in his case was a woman, and he expected to see a woman sitting at the prosecution table. He didn’t pull the trigger. I was waiting for him to pull the trigger.
“He was so calm. I could tell he was going to shoot everybody and shoot everybody accurately,” Robbins said. “I couldn’t tell you if that pause lasted for one second or 10 seconds.” During that pause, Robbins ran from the courtroom. “Apparently, after I ran out, he turned and shot (court reporter Julie Ann Brandau),” he said.
By the time it was all over, four people were dead: Barnes, 64; Brandau, 46; Fulton County sheriff’s Deputy Hoyt Teasley, 43; and federal agent David Wilhelm, 40. The shootings and the manhunt that followed kept this metro area of 4 million people in fear for 26 hours, and left many asking how a jailed suspect could get his hands on a gun, shoot two people in a courtroom, then elude the largest manhunt in state history.
Nichols was eventually captured Saturday at an apartment where he had taken a woman prisoner in Duluth, an Atlanta suburb. He could appear in federal court as early as today to face a charge of possession of a firearm by a person under indictment, the charge authorities are using to keep him in custody while they investigate the slayings.
U.S. Attorney David Nahmias said his office and Fulton County authorities are sorting out what federal and state charges will be brought against Nichols.
Nichols is likely to face multiple state charges, including murder, kidnapping and aggravated assault, as well as federal charges in the death of Wilhelm, who allegedly was killed for his vehicle.
Neither Nahmias nor Erik Friedly, a spokesman for Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard, would say whether Nichols’ first court appearance would come on the state or federal charges.
Nichols had been in the Fulton County Jail for the past six months. He was on trial on a rape charge for the second time in as many weeks, and could have faced life in prison if convicted. His first rape trial ended in a mistrial last week.
In the rape case, Nichols is accused of breaking into his ex-girlfriend’s condominium, binding her with duct tape and assaulting her. Authorities say he brought a cooler stocked with food to the home for the crime. “He said he would assault her for three days until her birthday,” Howard said.
Nichols was being led without handcuffs to the courtroom Friday when he attacked his guard, Atlanta Deputy Police Chief Alan Dreher said. He grabbed her gun, then went looking for Barnes, his trial judge, Dreher said. (
Related:
Judges say security must be improved)
David Allman, an attorney who was herded at gunpoint with two court employees into Barnes’ chambers before the shootings, described the gunman as so composed that Allman thought he was a plainclothes policeman.
“He seemed to be very focused and very organized,” Allman said.
Allman was reading a newspaper and having a cup of coffee when he looked up and saw a well-dressed man herding a court secretary and a clerk toward Barnes’ chambers with a handgun. “He waved a gun at me,” Allman said. “I looked back down at the paper. I thought he was a cop going to clear the room for something, that they were going to bring in prisoners.”
He said the gunman ordered him and the two women into Barnes’ chambers. The gunman handcuffed Allman and the secretary and kept them there for several minutes.
Allman said the gunman walked in and out of Barnes’ office two or three times. At one point while the gunman was out of the office, Allman heard a scuffle. The gunman then returned, holding a deputy at gunpoint. The gunman handcuffed the deputy, put him in a closet and went into the courtroom. Allman heard two shots and screams from the courtroom.
After the courtroom shootings, Nichols ran downstairs and outside, Dreher said. Deputy Teasley tried to stop him and was killed. Nichols then allegedly carjacked a green Honda Accord belonging to an Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter who was assaulted at a downtown parking garage.
For most of the day and into Friday night, Atlanta media warned an edgy city to be on the lookout for the Honda. But Saturday, Atlanta Police Chief Richard Pennington said that the Honda had never left the garage where it was stolen and that Nichols had escaped on the subway to north Atlanta. That’s where he is accused of killing Wilhelm, the assistant special agent in charge of the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement office here. Wilhelm was off-duty and working on his house late Friday night.
Nichols allegedly stole Wilhelm’s pickup and his gun and badge and fled to Gwinnett County. There, he forced his way into a woman’s apartment, tied her up and held her hostage for several hours, Gwinnett County Police Chief Charles Walters said.
Just before 10 a.m. Saturday, Nichols let the woman go, and she called 911. About 11:30 a.m., police approached the apartment and saw Nichols inside watching TV coverage of the officers closing in.
He waved a white T-shirt to surrender.
Contributing: Associated Press
