UPDATED 11:15 P.M. FRIDAY Governor offers reward in courthouse shooting spree > Fulton judge, court reporter and deputy killed; reward offered > By MIKE MORRIS
, BETH WARREN > Published on: 03/11/05 As darkness sets in, local and state police are still engaged in a massive hunt for the suspect in a shocking shooting spree that left a Fulton County judge, deputy and court reporter dead and another deputy wounded this morning. Police are desperately trying to corner Brian Nichols, 33, who reportedly grabbed a deputy's handgun and escaped a holding room where he was being held before court convened in his rape trial. Fulton Sheriff's Sgt. Mike Thompson and other officials said Nichols took a gun from Deputy Cynthia Hall, who was alone with the 6-foot, 1-inch Nichols. She had just unhandcuffed his hands to let him change out of his jail uniform into street clothes for court. After a struggle, Nichols allegedly shot her in the head, wounding her. He took the deputy's keys, escaped the holding cell and ran to the courtroom where his rape trial was being held. According to sources close to Fulton Superior Court Judge Rowland Barnes' staff, Nichols burst into the judge's courtroom, and took a deputy and several staff hostage. He quickly handcuffed them, then stormed into the courtroom. He held several people at gunpoint there before fatally shooting Judge Barnes and court reporter Julie Ann Brandau, 43, of Snellville, said Thompson. Then he fled down several flights of stairs and ran out of the courthouse. A second deputy, identified by Thompson as Hoyt Teasley, was fatally shot on Martin Luther King Jr. Drive while pursuing Nichols. The suspect made his getaway after stealing an AJC reporter's green Honda Accord a few blocks away. The car, however, was found late Friday night in the parking lot from which it was stolen. Meanwhile, Gov. Sonny Perdue offered a $10,000 reward in the case late this afternoon, and the reward grew throughout the night Assistant Atlanta Police Chief Alan Dreher released tipline numbers for people to call if they have information on the whereabouts of Nichols. Police set up 404-730-7983 and 404-730-7984. Hall is listed in critical but stable condition at Grady Memorial Hospital, where's she's being treated for head trauma and facial fractures. "She has a small crack in her skull, she has some fractures around her right eye and a small bruise in her brain," said Dr. Jeffrey Salomone, trauma surgeon. As of Friday evening, X-rays showed no significant swelling in Hall's brain but that could change at any time and be indicative of a more serious injury, Salomone said. Hall wasn't shot in the mouth, as was widely reported, the Grady physician said. "When we first were evaluating her, we were told she had been shot," Salomone said. "She's got a wound on her forehead but whether it's a graze wound from a bullet or whether she was assaulted with something or whether she was struck from behind and fell forward, we don't know." Teasley was treated for cardiac arrest at the scene, and during the ambulance transport. Life-saving measures continued at Grady but failed. He was pronounced dead about the same time that the second wounded deputy was rolled in, Salomone said. "He [Teasley] had at least one gunshot wound to his mid-abdomen," Salomone said. Earlier this week, a shank -- a homemade knife -- was found in Nichols' shoe during a search, said two officials in the district attorney's office who spoke on condition of anonymity. The shank was confiscated and extra deputies were assigned as security in the courtroom, one official told the Associated Press. Several Atlanta, Forsyth and DeKalb schools were secured or locked down during the search this afternoon. The Georgia Dome brought in extra security to reassure skittish fans at the SEC men's basketball tournament. The state Department of Transportation posted a description on the overhead signs along metro interstates of a vehicle the suspect was believed to be driving. The 1997 green Honda Accord was found Friday night. The suspect apparently carjacked several vehicles following the shooting, which occurred about 9 a.m. Atlanta Journal-Constitution reporter Don O'Briant was injured at a parking deck a few blocks from the courthouse during a carjacking. A previous carjacking occurred at a parking deck several blocks from the courthouse. John Oglesby, vice president of Impark, the company that owns that parking deck at the corner of Cone and Poplar streets, said a man in a tow truck entered the parking lot and the first person he saw was a female AJC employee on the fourth level of the deck. He commandeered her car at gunpoint, forced her from her vehicle and took her purse.The newspaper employee, Almeta Kilgo, was not injured. The suspect left the parking deck in her car, turning north on Cone Street. A court administrator on the sixth floor of the courthouse said he heard shots shortly after 9 a.m., and the courthouse was put on lockdown afterward. Nichols was on trial today in Barnes' courtroom on six charges including rape, aggravated sodomy, false imprisonment, aggravated assault with intent to rape, burglary and drug possession, according to the Fulton County sheriff's office. Nichols' rape trial was set to resume in the afternoon, said Fulton County District Attorney's spokesman Erik Friedly. Friedly said Nichols was going to be cross-examined today. He said Judge Barnes was finishing up a civil proceeding before his second criminal trial resumed. Nichols was not cuffed, which Friedly said is not unusual. "Even if the defendant is in jail at the time of the trial, he's allowed to wear street clothes in order to not prejudice the jury." Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard said, "I think he probably realized ... he might be convicted this time, he might not have a chance to walk out. We believe he came here with the intent to make sure that didn't happen." Defense attorney Renee Rockwell was walking into Judge Barnes' courtroom just as the shooting took place. "I saw hats on the ground and all the deputies were running with guns drawn. You don't ever see that," Rockwell said. She said she was pushed into an elevator by deputies. One of the deputies was crying. Rockwell said the deputy told her: "The defendant got the gun and shot the judge." Rockwell said she knew that the defendant had been in court the previous week and had been a "difficult defendant." According to Fulton prosecutor Gayle Abramson, Nichols was accused of going to his ex-girlfriend's apartment in North Fulton in August and holding her hostage for hours during which he repeatedly sexually assaulted her. A juror in the rape trial, James Bailey, from Sandy Springs, said the trial started on Tuesday and the prosecution had finished its case when the shootings occurred, but the jury was not in the courtroom. "I can't believe it," said Bailey. "I thought the guy was guilty from the beginning. I guess he knew it too." Bailey said Nichols made him and other jurors nervous. "Every time he looked up, he was staring at you," Bailey said. News of the shooting stunned those in the legal community, like lawyer David Wolfe of Atlanta. "Everybody knew Judge Barnes to be one of the judges that both sides would want to have on a case because he was knowledgeable about the law. He tempered everything he did with compassion," Wolfe said. Mike Mears, director of Georgia Public Defender Standards Council, mourned the loss of Barnes. "He was an extraordinarily good, fair, judge," said Mears. "He was an extremely nice person. He was one of those judges who took every case seriously and had great respect for the attorneys who appeared before him." Criminal defense attorney Dennis Scheib was trying a murder case on the eighth floor when "deputies came running in with their guns drawn and said a judge was shot." While Scheib waited across the street to return to the courthouse, he got cell phone updates about the shooting from his paralegal. Scheib, who was a police officer for 13 years, said the deputies were too lax with their guns around inmates and defendants. In DeKalb County, he said any time deputies approach a prisoner, they take their guns off and 10 or 15 other armed deputies are present. "They're just so undermanned over here." Peter Zeliff, an Atlanta defense attorney who represented Nichols until December, called the shooting a "terrible tragedy." Zeliff said Nichols is now represented by attorney Barry Hazen. Zeliff criticized security at the courthouse. "I can think of a half dozen other examples of when something like this could have happened," he said. "Security is abysmal." "This is a nightmare," said Fulton County Superior Court reporter Evelyn Parker. "This was bound to happen I guess, but this is unbelievable." Judge Barnes' wife, Claudia Barnes, who works for another judge as an administrative assistant, was in the courthouse when the shooting occurred, said family friend and Fulton Juvenile Court Judge Sanford Jones . Claudia Barnes has worked in the court system for 25 years, serving as an assistant to Jones during some of that time, he said. Barnes was well-liked, a "prankster, a good judge and a good human," said Jones, who has known Barnes for 25 years. Jones performed the marriage ceremony for the Barnes' about 15 years ago. "It was his manner in court to treat everyone appropriately and with dignity, and when you left his court, you knew you had been treated that way," Jones said. "He was doing what he loved doing, but [his death] was premature."
# posted by Michael P. Whelan : 10:02 PM
