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Man charged with sexual assault says police violated Miranda rights

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Rally held in support of raising state’s minimum wage

<p>SCRANTON &#8212; Jessie Con-ui is no monster, just a man who did a monstrous thing when he murdered prison guard Eric Williams, his defense attorney argued before asking the jury to spare Con-ui&#8217;s life Thursday.</p><p>&#8220;It&#8217;s easy to kill a monster,&#8221; attorney Mark Fleming said during closing arguments of the penalty phase of the inmate&#8217;s capital murder trial. &#8220;It&#8217;s much harder to kill a human being whose life impacts others.&#8221;</p><p>Fleming&#8217;s pitch for a life sentence for his client came as part of more than five hours of closings from four different attorneys. It was all heard by the same jury that last month found Con-ui, 40, guilty of murdering Williams, 34, of Nanticoke. Con-ui killed the guard with a pair of homemade plastic shanks in a brutal attack inside U.S. Penitentiary Canaan in Wayne County in 2013.</p><p>The trial that has already lasted months won&#8217;t conclude until at least next week after U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo charged jurors late Thursday, but informed them they would return to begin deliberations Monday.</p><p>With one last opportunity to address the panel until then, the attorneys made their final cases for life or death.</p><p>Justice will never be balanced out in this case, Fleming said. No matter the outcome, Williams&#8217; family lost a son and a brother, and sentencing Con-ui to die would only inflict the same suffering on another innocent family, he argued.</p><p>&#8220;I ask you to show mercy,&#8221; Fleming said.</p><p>Mercy, however, was not something shown by Con-ui, prosecutors argued.</p><p>A death penalty would not only be appropriate considering Con-ui&#8217;s history of violence and the vicious way in which he killed Williams, they said, it would be justified.</p><p>Con-ui, a gang-related murder conviction already to his name, stood perched atop a stairway inside the cell block where Williams was on duty alone, &#8220;looking for his prey,&#8221; said Robert J. Feitel, an attorney with the Department of Justice&#8217;s Capital Case Section.</p><p>Upon reaching the top of the stairway, the unsuspecting guard was met with a kick to the face that sent him tumbling backward down the flight of steel stairs, banging his head at one point before mustering the strength and wherewithal to stand up and run, Feitel said.</p><p>Williams managed to get a few feet from the stairs before an armed Con-ui caught up to him and &#8220;attacked him mercilessly.&#8221; For a second time, Williams got up and escaped Con-ui only to be caught again moments later.</p><p>&#8220;This is where the defendant has at it,&#8221; Feitel said.</p><p>In between the 200 stabs, 11 kicks and six stomps to Williams&#8217; head and body, Con-ui pauses to wipe the sweat from his brow; wrap a cut sustained from the repeated thrusts of his sharpened weapons; and chew gum he took from his victim&#8217;s pocket in a series of unabashed acts that &#8220;shocks the conscience,&#8221; Feitel said.</p><p>&#8220;That is depravity on a whole other level,&#8221; he continued, as a still photo of Con-ui rearing back with a sharpened plastic shank in his hand played to the jury. &#8220;He&#8217;s relishing this murder. He&#8217;s loving it. He&#8217;s enjoying it. This is sport to him.&#8221;</p><p>The recording of the nearly 11-minute attack, which prosecutors say happened because Con-ui felt disrespected, was previously played in court.</p><p><strong>&#8216;Meaningless words&#8217;</strong></p><p>The killing wasn&#8217;t Con-ui&#8217;s first murder let alone his first act of violence, Feitel argued.</p><p>In 2002, Con-ui murdered fellow New Mexican Mafia gang member Carlos Garcia outside an Arizona laundromat. While behind bars, he beat another inmate with a metal food tray, stabbed another fellow inmate, and threatened a guard, Feitel said. Other plans to kill were thwarted before Con-ui could carry them out, he added.</p><p>With the blood of the stabbed inmate still on his clothing, Con-ui told a guard it &#8220;was just one of those days,&#8221; Feitel said.</p><p>Feitel told the jury that prosecutors proved the aggravating factors in the case beyond a doubt.</p><p>Aggravating factors are acts or characteristics that support a death sentence, while mitigating factors support a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole.</p><p>The defense laid out 61 such factors. They included Con-ui&#8217;s stepfather, Gary Sliney, who the defense claimed was abusive toward Con-ui and kicked him out of his home on multiple occasions, as well as Con-ui&#8217;s early life of poverty, exposure to domestic violence, and extensive time in Arizona state prison that his attorneys said failed to rehabilitate him for a life outside prison walls.</p><p>&#8220;You are going to find aggravating and mitigating factors,&#8221; defense attorney David Ruhnke said in his portion of closings. &#8220;The moment of truth is how you weigh those factors.&#8221;</p><p>If the jury cannot agree on a death sentence, life in prison is automatically imposed by the judge.</p><p>In a brief statement to the jury last week, Con-ui apologized for killing Williams and for the suffering he caused Williams&#8217; family, friends, and coworkers, but claimed he couldn&#8217;t explain why he murdered him. He asked the jury to spare his life for the sake of his own family.</p><p>In a rebuttal to the defense closing argument, Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert O&#8217;Hara said Con-ui&#8217;s words were &#8220;empty&#8221; and &#8220;meaningless.&#8221;</p><p>&#8220;Jessie Con-ui&#8217;s actions speak much louder than his meaningless words,&#8221; O&#8217;Hara said.</p><style>
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<div class="neCaption">Con-ui </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/web1_conui.jpg</photo0><caption0>Con-ui </caption0><photoCredit0></photoCredit0></div><div class="neFile"><img class="neImage" src="https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/web1_Eric-Williams-cmyk.jpg">
<div class="neCaption">Williams </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo1>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/web1_Eric-Williams-cmyk.jpg</photo1><caption1>Williams </caption1><photoCredit1></photoCredit1></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta><p>By Joe Dolinsky</p><p>jdolinsky@www.timesleader.com</p></bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta><p><strong>Mistrial Motion Denied</strong></p><p>A defense motion for a mistrial on claims portions of prosecutors&#8217; closings were improper nearly derailed the trial late Thursday, but the motion was denied after U.S. District Judge A. Richard Caputo said he found no such evidence.</p></factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta><p>Reach Joe Dolinsky at 570-991-6110 or on Twitter @JoeDolinskyTL</p></shirttailMeta></div>

Prosecution, defense make one last pitch in Con-ui case