Jones faces possible death sentence

It took two days to pick the jury that would hear the capital murder case against the Opelika man accused of killing his infant son nearly two years ago.

It took the state of Alabama nearly two days for all its witnesses to testify.

It took a 12-member jury an hour Friday afternoon to find Barry Lee Jones, 20, guilty of capital murder in the death of his 7-month-old son, Kevin Christopher Jones.

Circuit Court Judge Jacob A. Walker III asked Jones and those in the courtroom, which included members of Jones’ family, not to display emotion when the verdict was read. They obliged.

The jury will return to the courtroom at 9 a.m. Monday to begin the sentencing phase. It will decide whether Jones should be given life in prison without parole or the death penalty.

Jones was charged with capital murder, sexual assault, sodomy and rape in connection with Kevin’s death, and injury to a 3-year-old non-relative girl on Dec. 11, 2007. However, this trial focused only on the capital murder charge.

Jones did not testify, but in an earlier affidavit, he claimed that he had been hit on the head by an an unknown person and that when he regained consciousness the children were injured.

He showed no emotion during the week-long trial, sitting between his lawyers, speaking only to them and, on occasion, to family members, who sat behind him all week.

But he broke his silence Friday morning, when he and his lawyers appeared before Walker to discuss the possibility of him testifying.

Walker told Jones he was not required to testify.

“Is it your decision to testify?” Walker asked.

“Yes, it is, sir,” responded Jones.

Jones left the courtroom to discuss the issue with his mother. When they returned, he told the judge he had changed his mind. The defense rested immediately afterward.

Earlier Friday, the defense called one of its two witnesses, Barbara Mitchell, who lives on Toomers Court in Opelika, where Jones, his wife and two children lived. She recalled seeing two men standing outside a home across the street when she was hanging her laundry between 8 and 9 a.m. Dec. 11.

“There were two black boys standing on the side of the house,” Mitchell said. “That’s all I know. I don’t know their names or nothing.”

The state had no rebuttal witnesses to Mitchell or the other defense witness, Opelika police Cpl. Jason Dunson, who testified Thursday about a security video taken from a local convenience store.

The jury of seven white men and five women — two of them black — began deliberations about 3 p.m. Friday after hearing closing arguments from the opposing attorneys.

During his closing argument, Lee County assistant district attorney Kenny Gibbs recounted the injuries that caused Kevin’s death.

Gibbs said Kevin was used as a “bludgeoning instrument” to hit the young girl, which caused the boy’s death and left her with life-threatening injuries.

Dr. Stephen Boudreaux with the Alabama Department of Forensic Sciences testified Wednesday that Kevin suffered at least two “significant blows,” one each to the chest and abdomen that tore his liver, damaged surrounding tissue, and fractured multiple ribs. The cause of Kevin’s death was blunt force trauma, Gibbs said.

When Gibbs showed pictures of the baby boy’s body, covered with bruises, one female juror began to cry.

Todd Crutchfield, the court-appointed defense attorney, noted the testimony of the multi-care technician at East Alabama Medical Center, who said Jones was “distressed” when he came in with Kevin that morning.

Crutchfield also downplayed DNA testing on Jones’ stain-covered quilt.

He said the Opelika Police Department didn’t follow up on Mitchell’s claim of seeing two men near the home. He claimed “they got their man,” so there was no need to investigate any further.

William Whatley, a veteran defense attorney out of Montgomery, called Kevin’s death a “horrible, terrible crime,” but said the state’s claim that Jones was responsible didn’t add up. He questioned how a 20-pound, 7-month-old child could be used to inflict injury, and why the quilt wasn’t soaked with blood.

“We are here about blunt force trauma and the death of Kevin,” he said. “The other stuff is just to keep you so inflamed and aggravated that you want to convict him.”

Whatley said Jones still maintains his innocence, as he has all along, and he urged the jury to find him not guilty.

In his rebuttal, chief trial assistant district attorney Robbie Treese urged the jury to use common sense.

If Jones still contends that he was hit so hard in the head, he was knocked unconscious and another person hurt the children, Treese said his head would have been “a bloody mess.” The two doctors who examined him on Dec. 11 and found no signs of trauma on Jones’ head didn’t lie and wouldn’t perjury themselves, he said.