Death penalty trial opens in 2001 slaying

By Ed White Associated Press Writer DETROIT (AP) -- A man charged with killing an armored-truck courier took part in the 2001 fatal robbery in suburban Detroit but was "clueless" and incapable of plotting the heist, a defense lawyer said Monday at the start of a trial that could lead to a death sentence. Michigan does not have the death penalty. But Timothy O'Reilly is being prosecuted in federal court and could face execution if convicted of murdering 30-year-old Norman Stephens in the middle of the night while he was replenishing ATMs in December 2001. Prosecutors say O'Reilly, 37, shot Stephens in the back and legs outside of the Dearborn Federal Credit Union. They say O'Reilly and his cohorts wore masks and dark clothes, and planned the attack weeks in advance. "That's how they left him ... surrounded by ATM slips," Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Chasteen told jurors during his opening statement as he displayed a picture of the slain Stephens. Chasteen said at least two co-conspirators will testify against O'Reilly. But the key evidence will be his own incriminating statements secretly recorded by an inmate in state prison in 2004, three years after the slaying. "You will hear him discuss and laugh about these things," said Chasteen, who pledged that the evidence "will be well beyond any reasonable doubt." Defense attorney Richard Kammen said O'Reilly was living with his parents in Camarillo, Calif., when he came under the spell of co-defendant Norman Duncan, a Detroit man he met at a car club who encouraged him to move to Michigan. "He is not retarded. He just doesn't fit in the world," Kammen said of O'Reilly. "On the inside, Tim O'Reilly is weak but he wants to appear strong. In situations he is completely clueless but he wants to appear street-wise and smart. He wants desperately to belong." While serving a state sentence in a different case, O'Reilly foolishly told an inmate about the credit union robbery -- "another mark of how clueless he is," Kammen said. He said some words on the recording are true while others are "nonsense" and "fanciful." Kammen insisted that O'Reilly didn't fire the fatal shots. "Tim comes by the nickname 'Big Goofy' honestly," Kammen said, referring to his habit of talking to other prisoners. If O'Reilly is convicted, the trial will move to a second stage where the jury must decide whether he should live or die. The government has indicated it would pursue death sentences for Duncan and co-defendant Kevin Watson when they stand trial. The last death penalty trial in Detroit was in 2003, when a drug dealer was convicted of killing a rival. The jury, however, declined to sentence John Bass to death. In western Michigan, a federal jury in 2002 put Marvin Gabrion on death row for killing a woman in a remote lake in a national forest. His case still is being appealed. Published: Wed, Jul 14, 2010

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