Jessica's killer sentenced to die

INVERNESS -- John Couey will die by lethal injection for the brutal 2005 murder of Jessica Marie Lunsford of Homosassa, a judge ruled today.

The death sentence is something Jessica's family hoped for.

"I think he needs to stand up and be a man now and take his death penalty . . . and I hope he rots in hell," Mark Lunsford said, just a day after his daughter's body was found buried in a shallow grave on March 19, 2005.

Couey, 49, got his death sentence from Circuit Judge Richard Howard at a 2 p.m. sentencing hearing at the Citrus County Courthouse.

Before passing sentence, the judge read his entire order, recounting the gruesome facts of the case in chronological order.

Based on testimony from the trial, Howard explained how Couey confessed to raping Jessica and spoke of the sexual assault in "crude, vulgar and repulsive comments" made to corrections officers. Howard also recounted in detail how Couey bound Jessica's hands with speaker wire, had her step into one black plastic garbage bag, which he knotted over her head, and then slipped another garbage bag over the first one, which he then knotted below her feet before burying her alive in a hole dug behind the mobile home he shared with his sister, Dorothy Dixon.

He described the little girl's death as a "slow, suffering, conscious death" and said a civilized society "recoils in horror" at the suffering Jessica endured at Couey's hands.

Howard had to pause several times during his lengthy recitation to drink water.

The judge also went through each of the aggravating and mitigating factors presented by attorneys in the case.

Throughout the hearing, Couey shifted uncomfortably in his seat, and cast his eyes downward until the point where Howard announced the death sentence.

Lunsford, along with his parents Archie and Ruth Lunsford also attended the hearing. All three appeared red-eyed, their faces grief-stricken

The courtroom also was packed with law enforcement officials, including Citrus County Sheriff Jeff Dawsy, who spearheaded the investigation.

Meanwhile, in Jessica's hometown of Homosassa, the people at Mike's Friendly Pub watched the proceedings on TV. The barroomn erupted in applause when the judge announced the death sentence.

The bartender, Pam Murrin, pumped her fist and said "yes!"

"It's a relief, not that it will bring that little girl back," Murrin said

Defense attorneys Alan Fanter and Daniel Lewan pleaded to save the killer's life.

In a motion filed earlier this month, they asked for mercy and called Couey's crime one of impulse and stupidity. They also referred to Couey's poor upbringing.

"Certainly the death of Jessica Lunsford was a tragic occurrence, and there is no justification for that. However, when looking at the lack of opportunity and chances that the defendant had throughout his life, the abuse he suffered, his mental deficiencies and the tragic series of events that led up to this crime, it is clear a life sentence.... is the only sentence that would be justified," Fanter wrote.

Couey expected a death sentence.

In a recorded jailhouse conversation with aunt Virginia Kloetzer on Aug. 3. Couey blamed himself for his "stupidity," according to an Associated Press account.

"I kick myself in the butt a hundred times a day," Couey said at another point. "Stupidity. I just keep asking myself, 'Why were you so stupid?' "

He later told his aunt: "We all know what he's going to do," apparently referring to the death sentence he expected to received from Judge Howard.

Couey was convicted in March of burglary, kidnapping, sexual battery and murder in the slaying of the 9-year-old. The same six-man, six-woman, Miami jury recommended in a 10-2 vote that the convicted sex offender be sentenced to death.

Jessica was abducted from her grandparents' home in the early morning hours of Feb. 24, 2005. Police uncovered her body a little over three weeks later after Couey confessed the crime to Citrus County detectives in a statement that was later thrown out as trial evidence.

Couey, who was already a convicted sex offender, told authorities where to find the girl - buried in a shallow grave he dug behind the mobile home he shared with his sister. Jessica's grave was less than 150 yards from her grandparents' home.

In his confession, Couey told detectives he slipped into the Lunsford home, took Jessica along with a stuffed toy dolphin, and brought the girl to his sister's home. There he raped her before binding her wrists with speaker wire and placing her in two black plastic garbage bags. Then he buried her alive.

When police uncovered her body, they found Jessica had poked two fingers through the garbage bags. Her stuffed dolphin was found tucked between her arms.