Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 6, 1994 TAG: 9403060130
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Knight-Ridder/Tribune
DATELINE: PENSACOLA, FLA. LENGTH: Medium
The jury deliberated only two hours and 40 minutes. Ten minutes after the guilty verdict came in, Griffin was sentenced to life in prison with a minimum of 25 years to serve before he is eligible for parole. Griffin shot Gunn three times in his back outside the Pensacola clinic last March 10.
Griffin, 32, stood impassive as the verdict was read. One juror confirmed her verdict in a weeping voice. Judge John Parnham thanked the jury for their service and strongly urged them not to discuss their deliberations with the news media, in order to safeguard the "sanctity" of the jury process.
Then the judge passed sentence: "I'm going to sentence the defendant, Michael Griffin, to a term of incarceration in the Florida Department of Corrections for the remainder of his natural life, to serve a minimum, mandatory 25 years before he is eligible for parole.
"Good luck to you, Griffin," Parnham added. The judge also ruled that the year Griffin has spent behind bars would be credited to his sentence. Then, as his wife Patricia dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief, the former Monsanto chemical plant worker was led over to be fingerprinted, then taken out of the courtroom. He said nothing to the judge before being sentenced.
Gunn's son, David Gunn Jr., smiled and embraced his sister. He also shook hands with prosecutor Jim Murray.
"I felt justice had in fact been served," said Gunn, 23, a college student in Birmingham, Ala. "Griffin does need to be robbed of the rest of his natural life as he robbed my father of his natural life."
The speedy verdict brought to an end a year's worth of delays and motions by Griffin, who maintained at his trial that he could no longer remember what happened the morning the Eufaula, Ala., physician was shot.
Gunn's murder was the first slaying of an abortion doctor in modern U.S. history and climaxed an escalating wave of protests that included bombings and invasions of abortion clinics to destroy their equipment, harassment and photographing of women who visited them and the brandishing of preserved fetuses in jars to frighten people away. All these tactics have been used in Pensacola.
Griffin rejected three attorneys and demanded to represent himself, causing continual delays and continuances in his case. He received fan mail from anti-abortion activists from all over the United States while in prison and seemed to revel in the role of avenger and martyr. He wrote letters to Parnham, accusing President Clinton, Attorney General Janet Reno and his victim of "treason." He asked for a delay in his trial, saying that certain witnesses he planned to call were as yet unborn.
The son of a prominent local dentist, Griffin had a troubled marriage and a history of violence against his wife. He forbade television in his home, and he and his wife kept their two girls out of school, fearing the ill effects of public education.
Months before Gunn's murder, Griffin became an associate of John Burt, an anti-abortion activist who runs a hostel for pregnant women in nearby Milton, Fla., where he deducts half his guests' welfare checks to pay his expenses. The Sunday before the doctor was shot, Griffin prayed publicly at his church that Gunn would repent and "give his life to Jesus."
Griffin finally accepted attorneys Robert Kerrigan and Bill Eddins as his defense lawyers. He never testified in his own defense. The trial began Monday and lasted six days.
Next to the verdict itself, the most dramatic moment Friday came when prosecutor Jim Murray dry-fired the murder weapon, a chrome-plated, snub-nosed Smith & Wesson .38 Special during his closing argument Friday. Three loud, metallic clicks echoed through the courtroom as the jury watched intently.
"Conscious, deliberate actions," Murray told the panel. "It takes 11 pounds of pressure to pull this trigger through, and that was done three times."
The guilty verdict was not unexpected, but the speed with which it was rendered was noteworthy. At least eight witnesses saw Griffin in the parking lot before, during and after the shooting. The gun found beside the doctor was Griffin's. He confessed to two police officers seconds after the shooting and again to his wife the following day, while in jail. That conversation was overheard by a jail guard, Brenda Fuqua, who repeated it in court.
"He said he killed him because of his beliefs and convictions, and if he had to go to jail for the rest of his life to save a baby, it would be worth it," Fuqua testified.
On Saturday, Griffin got his wish.
by CNB