Hearing set to discuss barring witness IDs in courthouse rampage

<p>Defense attorneys for accused courthouse gunman Brian Nichols want to block 17 eyewitnesses from testifying against him at his murder trial, and a judge Monday scheduled a hearing on their request.</p><p>The defense motion charges that police allegedly used improper techniques to gain identifications of the defendant.</p><p>Superior Court Judge Hilton Fuller said the Oct. 16 hearing will cover that motion and another defense motion seeking to bar an inmate whose cell was next to Nichols' from testifying about an alleged plot the two were hatching to escape from the county jail since the shootings.</p><p>Police say eyewitness testimony is among the strongest evidence they have tying Nichols to the murders of a judge, court reporter and sheriff's deputy at the Fulton County Courthouse on March 11, 2005, the murder of a federal agent later that day and various crimes he's accused of committing while on the run.</p><p>Nichols has pleaded not guilty. His murder trial is scheduled to begin Jan. 11. If he is convicted, prosecutors plan to seek the death penalty.</p><p>In their motion on the witnesses, defense lawyers say some out-of-court identifications of Nichols are unreliable because of suggestive comments made by police and because of other investigative procedures. As a result, the defense says those witnesses should be prevented from making the same identifications at trial.</p><p>The witnesses whom the defense is seeking to bar include a woman who says she was kidnapped and assaulted by a black man in the hours after the shooting; a woman who says she saw "a tall black guy with a blue shirt" on a street outside the courthouse fire shots from a "big gun in his right hand" at the deputy who was killed; and a newspaper reporter who was carjacked near the courthouse.</p><p>In the first instance, the defense says police showed the woman a single photograph, apparently of Nichols, and told her, "This is the guy." In the second instance, the defense says the woman's identification of Nichols, 12 days after the shooting, was influenced by her first having seen Nichols' picture on a television news show that described him as the shooter. The defense says the newspaper reporter also was influenced by seeing Nichols' picture on television.</p><p>Nichols was being retried on rape charges when prosecutors say he stole a deputy's handgun at the courthouse after the deputy removed his handcuffs to allow him to change out of his jail clothes and prepare for court.</p><p>Authorities say Nichols fatally shot the judge presiding over his rape trial, a court reporter chronicling the proceeding and a sheriff's deputy who chased him outside the courthouse. Nichols also is accused of killing a federal agent he encountered at a home north of downtown before surrendering the next day in an Atlanta suburb.</p>

http://accesswdun.com/article/2006/10/115508