Jury urges judge to sentence killer of nurse to death
A Florida judge will weigh a jury's recommendation to execute Gary Michael Hilton for killing a nurse in 2007 before scheduling a sentencing date.
A jury unanimously recommended the death penalty Monday for the 64-year-old drifter jurors convicted last week in the December 2007 slaying of a nurse whose beheaded body was found in the Apalachicola National Forest in the Florida panhandle.
Hilton previously admitted killing and decapitating a University of Georgia graduate he kidnapped Jan. 1, 2008, near Blood Mountain in North Georgia. Hilton is also a suspect in at least 3 other killings, 2 in North Carolina and 1 in Florida.
In the Florida case, Circuit Judge James C. Hankinson has the discretion to impose his own sentence in death cases but is supposed to give "great weight" to the jury's recommendation. Judges normally follow a jury's recommendation in capital cases.
The jury reached its recommendation Monday after about an hour of deliberations.
"If there was ever a case for it, this was it," State Attorney Willie Meggs said of the rare unanimous decision in a death case.
The same jury found Hilton guilty last week in the killing of 46-year-old Cheryl Dunlap of Crawfordville.
The headless bodies of both Dunlap and 24-year-old Meredith Emerson of Buford, a UGA graduate, were found in forests where Hilton had camped.
Dunlap's friend, Gloria Tucker of Crawfordville, expressed satisfaction with the jury's decision. But she said even Hilton's execution wouldn't bring total justice in the case of her friend, whom she called Sherri.
"I don't think any family members got justice," Tucker said. "He's no equal for Sherri. She grew up with a bad home life and grew up to be a lovely person."
(Source: The Associated Press)
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