Saturday, October 22, 2004
Prosecutors will request the death penalty for the man charged last December in the 1984 killing of Deborah Sykes, a newspaper copy editor, in downtown Winston-Salem.
A hearing has been scheduled for Nov. 2 in Forsyth Superior Court after the man, Willard E. Brown, rejected two different plea offers that would have required him to plead guilty to first-degree murder, rape, robbery and kidnapping in the attack on Sykes, who worked for The Sentinel.
Assistant District Attorney Eric Saunders said that both offers would have resulted in Brown receiving a sentence of life in prison, plus an additional number of years. Some of the charges would have been consolidated for sentencing under the offers.
Another man, Darryl Hunt, spent 18 years in prison for Sykes' murder. Hunt was exonerated in February after DNA testing linked Brown to the crime, and police said that Brown confessed to committing the crimes and acting alone.
Saunders said he considered Brown's confession in deciding to make a plea offer.
"I think we gave some consideration to the fact that, although it was kind of an 11th-hour statement by him admitting that he did it and absolving Darryl Hunt of any involvement, we thought it ought to get consideration for attempting to heal the community," he said.
Saunders said he believes that a prolonged trial would be harder on a community frequently divided by racial lines for years over Hunt's role in the case. The fact that the murder occurred so long ago also makes a trial more difficult, Saunders said.
He said he insisted that an additional number of years be added onto Brown's life sentence under the plea offer because Hunt received a life sentence when he was convicted.
"We're of the opinion that the guy who did it should get more time than the guy who didn't do it," Saunders said.
Brown's attorney, Pete Clary, declined to comment on the plea offers. He said he was surprised by prosecutors' decision to request the death penalty, but he would not elaborate on the reasons why.
Brown, if he is convicted or pleads guilty, will be sentenced under a set of state guidelines known as fair sentencing, which were in effect when Sykes was killed. Under fair sentencing, a defendant convicted of first-degree murder and given a life sentence is eligible for parole after 20 years. However, sentencing experts say that chances are slim that a parole board would authorize release in any first-degree murder case.
Under structured-sentencing guidelines, enacted in 1994, first-degree murder is punishable only by the death penalty or by life in prison without the possibility of parole.
The Nov. 2 hearing - what's known as a Rule 24 hearing - is required in capital cases.
At the hearing, Saunders will lay out the state's reasons for pursuing the death penalty, and a judge will have a clerk notify the state's capital defender to appoint co-counsel for Brown.
In a February indictment against Brown on the murder charge, Saunders included one of the aggravating factors under which state law allows the prosecution to ask for the death penalty in a first-degree murder case: "the murder was especially heinous, atrocious and cruel."
Prosecutors can still offer Brown a plea at any point before a jury ends deliberations at trial.
Saunders said he does not think that Brown's case will go to trial for at least a year.
• Lisa Hoppenjans can be reached at 727-7232 or at lhoppenjans@wsjournal.com