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01-08-2006, 10:58 AM
BY Jerrie Whiteley
Herald Democrat
It took jurors less than 45 minutes in March to conclude death was the only punishment for arguably the most shocking crime to hit Grayson County in years.
Jurors sentenced Andre Thomas to die for killing 13 month-old Leyha Marie Hughes. The child was the second one born to Thomas' wife, Laura Boren Thomas. Police found Leyha, her mother, and Andre Boren, a son Boren and Thomas had together before breaking up, butchered in their Sherman apartment just one year before the trial began in Feburary.
Thomas turned himself in to police, hours after the killing and admitted to kicking in the door to their apartment before attacking them.
During the first week of the trial, jurors listened to video and audio tapes in which Thomas told investigators he killed the three because he thought his wife was Jezebel and his little boy was the anti-christ. Little Leyha, Thomas said, was a demon.
Thomas' guilt of the murders was never questioned during the trial. Prosecutors Joe Brown and Kerye Ashmore fought with defense attorneys Bobbie Peterson and R.J. Hagood over Thomas' mental state at the time of the crime. Peterson and Hagood argued that Thomas had suffered from mental illness for years before the killings and that illness drove him to commit the unspeakable crimes.
Brown and Ashmore said the crimes sprang from Thomas' habit of mixing alcohol with marijuana and Coricidin. Mental health experts appeared for both sides. Those on Thomas' side went back through his repeated pleas for help with religious delusions that left him, they said, thinking God was communicating with him. Experts for the defense concentrated on the effect that the drug use would have had on Thomas' mental state. They contended that but for the drug use, Thomas would have continued to be mentally ill, but not violent.
In the end, the jury sided with prosecutors and took very little time in making the decision about the guilt or the punishment.
Currently, Thomas sits on Texas' death row awaiting while his case is appealed through a lengthy set of stages in both the state and federal court. His request for a new trial was denied in May.
http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/200...life/life06.txt (http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/2005/12/31/life/life06.txt)
Herald Democrat
It took jurors less than 45 minutes in March to conclude death was the only punishment for arguably the most shocking crime to hit Grayson County in years.
Jurors sentenced Andre Thomas to die for killing 13 month-old Leyha Marie Hughes. The child was the second one born to Thomas' wife, Laura Boren Thomas. Police found Leyha, her mother, and Andre Boren, a son Boren and Thomas had together before breaking up, butchered in their Sherman apartment just one year before the trial began in Feburary.
Thomas turned himself in to police, hours after the killing and admitted to kicking in the door to their apartment before attacking them.
During the first week of the trial, jurors listened to video and audio tapes in which Thomas told investigators he killed the three because he thought his wife was Jezebel and his little boy was the anti-christ. Little Leyha, Thomas said, was a demon.
Thomas' guilt of the murders was never questioned during the trial. Prosecutors Joe Brown and Kerye Ashmore fought with defense attorneys Bobbie Peterson and R.J. Hagood over Thomas' mental state at the time of the crime. Peterson and Hagood argued that Thomas had suffered from mental illness for years before the killings and that illness drove him to commit the unspeakable crimes.
Brown and Ashmore said the crimes sprang from Thomas' habit of mixing alcohol with marijuana and Coricidin. Mental health experts appeared for both sides. Those on Thomas' side went back through his repeated pleas for help with religious delusions that left him, they said, thinking God was communicating with him. Experts for the defense concentrated on the effect that the drug use would have had on Thomas' mental state. They contended that but for the drug use, Thomas would have continued to be mentally ill, but not violent.
In the end, the jury sided with prosecutors and took very little time in making the decision about the guilt or the punishment.
Currently, Thomas sits on Texas' death row awaiting while his case is appealed through a lengthy set of stages in both the state and federal court. His request for a new trial was denied in May.
http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/200...life/life06.txt (http://www.heralddemocrat.com/articles/2005/12/31/life/life06.txt)