James Coleman may have killed his girlfriend in a rage, but the baby's death was planned, the jury finds.
By CHRISTOPHER GOFFARD
Published May 25, 2004
TAMPA - Jurors deliberated about five hours Monday before finding James Coleman guilty of first-degree murder for the death of a 10-week-old baby he admitted to suffocating and placing in his freezer.
The same jury, however, rejected the prosecutor's call for a first-degree murder conviction in the death of Coleman's girlfriend, 19-year-old Jessica Hine, whom Coleman admitted strangling.
The jury instead said Coleman was guilty of second-degree murder, finding that her killing was not premeditated. The defense characterized it as "a crime of passion."
Coleman, 25, a Marine sergeant who worked at MacDill Air Force Base, was arrested in December 2002, days after Hine's body was found in a suitcase in the woods.
Last week, jurors heard a tape of Coleman confessing to Tampa police that he killed Hine in a struggle at the West Shore Boulevard apartment they shared, fearing his military career would be jeopardized if she reported he physically abused her.
Coleman also confessed he killed her baby, Devonte Coleman, whom he been raising as his own.
"The defendant had a purpose, whether that purpose makes sense today or not," prosecutor Jalal Harb told jurors Monday, adding that Coleman's hands were around Hine's neck for 15 to 20 seconds before she went unconscious.
"All she wanted to do was leave with Devonte."
The prosecutor reminded jurors that Coleman turned down the air conditioner in the apartment to slow Hine's decomposition as he kept her body there for days.
Even after killing Hine, the prosecutor said, Coleman had "many, many, many options" other than killing her child.
The prosecutor stood before jurors with a baby-sized doll and demonstrated how Coleman suffocated the child and wrapped him in plastic, then put him in a box.
The prosecutor noted that Coleman said he hesitated to kill the baby when the baby smiled at him. "He worked on himself to have it in him" to kill the baby, the prosecutor said.
In her closing argument Monday, Assistant Public Defender Lisa Campbell said there was no proof Coleman's actions pointed to premeditation.
"Irrational means no plan," the defense attorney said. "He acted without thought. It is the very antithesis of plan." She said Coleman killed Hine in a moment "so frenzied, so harried, so emotional" that it precluded reflection.
The jury will return Wednesday morning to Hillsborough Circuit Judge J. Rogers Padgett's courtroom to decide whether to recommend life in prison or the death penalty in the child's killing.
After the verdict, Hine's mother and 22-year-old sister approached Coleman's family. The families embraced and wept.
"I thought we were going to end up having a brawl outside because of the way they were looking at us, but I don't think that anymore," said Hine's mother, Shirley Mason.
She said she was satisfied with Monday's verdict and did not want the death penalty for Coleman.
"I don't want to see another mother without her child," Mason said. "I want life in prison without parole, but I don't think it's possible, because of the baby."
- Christopher Goffard can be reached at goffard@sptimes.com or 813 226-3337.
