Saturday, March 12, 2005
Fulton County Sheriff Myron Freeman speaks to news media, flanked by Atlanta Police Chief Richard Pennington, about murder suspect Brian Nichols during a news conference at Atlanta City Hall, Saturday, March 12, 2005, in Atlanta. Nichols, accused of killing a judge and two other people at a courthouse Friday, was captured at a suburban Atlanta apartment complex, hours after a federal immigration agent was discovered shot to death miles away. (AP Photo/Gregory Smith)
Atlanta Police Chief Richard Pennington speaks about captured shooting suspect Brian Nichols, during a news conference at City Hall in Atlanta, Saturday, March 12, 2005. A 911 call from a woman who had been held hostage for hours in her own apartment ended a daylong manhunt for Brian Nichols, a rape suspect accused of shooting a judge and two others at a courthouse and then later killing an immigration agent as he eluded authorities. (AP Photo/Gregory Smith)
Photo Highlight
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent David Wilhelm is shown in an undated photo provided by the department. Wilhelm was found shot to death Saturday, March 12, 2005, about 15 miles away from the scene in Duluth, Ga., where Brian Nichols, the suspect in Friday's courthouse shooting in Atlanta surrendered Saturday. Wilhelm's blue pickup truck, pistol and badge were missing. FBI (news
March 13, 2005 Police Capture Atlanta Suspect in Court Killings By SHAILA DEWAN
ATLANTA, March 12 - A killing spree that terrorized Atlanta over the last 24 hours ended Saturday morning when a man accused of killing a judge, a court reporter and a sheriff's deputy in a courthouse rampage surrendered peacefully after a SWAT team cornered him in the apartment of a woman he had taken hostage as she arrived home. As the suspect, Brian Nichols, was being driven away from the scene by F.B.I. agents, bystanders on the street cheered. Law enforcement officials said that before his arrest Saturday Mr. Nichols might have killed a fourth victim - a federal customs agent who was found shot to death hours earlier in Atlanta's affluent Buckhead community. Investigators said that the agent appeared to be a random victim. Mr. Nichols surrendered after a police SWAT team surrounded an apartment in Duluth, just north of Atlanta in Gwinnett County, where he had been holed up watching television, said Chief Charles Walters of the Gwinnett County Police Department. "He literally waved a white flag or a T-shirt and came out and surrendered to our folks," Chief Walters said. "We never contacted him." Mr. Nichols had forced his way into the apartment sometime in the early morning, as a woman who lived there was getting home, officials said. The two had no previous relationship, they said. "He had told her, 'If you do what I say I won't kill you,' " Vernon Keenan, the chief of the Georgia Bureau of the Investigation, said. On Friday morning, the police say, Mr. Nichols was being taken to a courtroom where he was on trial for rape when he overpowered his guard and fatally shot the two men and a woman. He made his escape by hijacking a series of cars, and he is suspected of taking the gun, badge and truck of the federal customs agent, the officials said. The body of the agent, David Wilhelm, was found about 9 a.m. Saturday in the upscale neighborhood of Buckhead, which lies between the Fulton County Courthouse in downtown Atlanta, where Friday's shootings took place, and Duluth, where the suspect was caught. At about 9:50 a.m., the woman there managed to leave her apartment and call 911, the officials said. Officials said it was not yet clear if she escaped or was allowed to leave. The truck taken from the customs agent was found in a different location, they said. Stunned residents of the complex, Bridgewater Apartments, watched as officers with guns and helmets surrounded the ground-floor unit and warned themto stay inside. Latoya Gathings, 25, said she slipped out in time to see Mr. Nichols in handcuffs, and catch a glimpse of his face. "He looked relieved," she said. For 24 hours, residents of the Atlanta area had cowered behind closed doors. Schools were under lockdown and the courthouse was evacuated, as a regionwide dragnet was deployed. The search for Mr. Nichols was set back and the Atlanta police suffered a public embarrassment when a green Honda that investigators believed Mr. Nichols had carjacked and used in his escape was found in the very parking garage where he commandeered it more than 12 hours earlier. For much of Friday, the police had concentrated their efforts on trying to track down the car, which Mr. Nichols is believed to have taken at gunpoint from a reporter for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Don O'Briant, as he was parking it. The authorities had issued an all points bulletin on the Honda, broadcasting its description and license plate number over television, radio and the highway alert network. But about 10 p.m. Friday, someone noticed the car in the garage and notified the police. Emerging details of the case drew a portrait of a cunning and violent fugitive. Mr. Nichols, on trial for rape and facing possible life in prison, wrested a gun from a sheriff's deputy who was escorting him to the courtroom on Friday about 9 a.m., the police say. Lt. Clarence Huber, a spokesman for the Fulton County Sheriff's Department, said late Friday evening that he did not know the standard procedures for escorting prisoners in the courthouse, and could not say what kind of holster the deputy, Cynthia Hall, had been issued. Deputy Hall, 51, described as about 5 feet tall, was apparently alone with Mr. Nichols, who is 6-foot-1 and weighs 210 pounds. She removed his handcuffs so he could change into street clothes before entering the courtroom, presided over by Judge Rowland W. Barnes, a popular figure who had served full time since 1998. As Mr. Nichols was dressing, he apparently attacked Deputy Hall, leaving her in critical condition with a head wound and facial fractures, investigators said. The police now say that Mr. Nichols overpowered a second deputy, handcuffing him and taking his gun as well. Richard L. Robbins, a lawyer who was in Judge Barnes's court at the time, said that Mr. Nichols entered from behind the bench, apparently having gone first to the judge's chambers. "He had this look in his eyes where he was completely calm," Mr. Robbins said. "He looked like he was going to kill everybody and enjoy it. I heard a loud bang, and I thought something fell over, and I saw the judge slump over and realized he had been shot. This guy was on his side; he never saw it coming. The way he looked, he was gone before he hit the floor. So the only consolation, if there is one, is I don't think he ever knew it happened." Mr. Robbins said he fled the courtroom before the court reporter, Julie Ann Brandau, was killed with a shot to the head. The police say Mr. Nichols then fled the building, killing a third victim, Sgt. Hoyt Teasley, a deputy sheriff, when the officer confronted him outside. Mr. Nichols was on trial in the rape of his ex-girlfriend, accused of holding her hostage for two days in her home while he raped her. He threatened to kill her and her family if she reported the rape, said Eric Friedly, a spokesman for the Fulton County district attorney's office. Ariel Hart and Rick Lyman contributed reporting for this article. Copyright 2005 The New York Times Company
