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The Fayetteville Observer
Mario Lynn Phillips could be sentenced to die if jurors decide he planned the killings.
Phillips is accused of killing and robbing Eddie Ryals, Carl “C.J.” Justice Jr., Joseph Allen Harden and Daryl Hobson, and of trying to kill Amanda Cooke Varner on Dec. 19, 2003.
Two other people, Sean Maurice Ray and Renee Yvette McLaughlin, also are linked to the murders, but neither has gone to trial. Prosecutors say the three shot, stabbed and robbed the group in Ryals’ home in Carolina Lakes, a mobile home park in Moore County.
Prosecutors said Phillips and Ray set fire to Ryals’ house after the shootings.
On Tuesday, Phillips’ lawyers argued that Phillips was intoxicated with drugs and alcohol when he shot Ryals, Justice, Harden, Hobson and Varner. Phillips, they argued, suffered from mental illnesses and struggled to deal with childhood traumas. Phillips’ brother, Jordan Phillips, had been shot in the head the same day Phillips shot the five in Carolina Lakes. His lawyers said the stress of his brother being shot left Phillips unable to consider the consequences of his actions.
“Those are the things that crossed that day,” said Richard Roose, one of Phillips’ defense lawyers. “He was in a state of rage.”
Roose and Bruce Cunningham, who is Phillips’ lead defense lawyer, argued that the evidence presented during Phillips’ trial was not enough to prove Phillips went to Ryals’ house to purposefully kill anyone.
Prosecutors argued that Phillips did go to the house to kill Ryals. They said he tucked a gun inside his pants, collected extra ammunition and drove from Fayetteville to Ryals house in Moore County. Though Ray and McLaughlin were there during the attacks and Ray is accused of stabbing the five and setting the house on fire, prosecutors described Phillips as the ringleader and said he orchestrated the murders.
Even if Phillips did not go to the house to kill anyone, prosecutors argued, the attacks lasted about an hour – enough time for him to decide whether to stop the killings or continue.
Prosecutors showed photographs of the men who were killed and read from a statement Varner wrote from her hospital bed in 2003.
Maureen Krueger, Moore County district attorney, said if Phillips had snapped and been unable to control his actions, he would have killed Ray and McLaughlin, too.
Phillips, she said, “decided and debated who was going to live and who was going to die.”
Jurors are scheduled to return to court today to start deliberating their verdict.
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Phillips gets death sentence — (The Fayetteville Observer)
Paul Woolverton Staff writer
Oct 18, 2007
The jury deliberated nearly four-and-a-half hours before sentencing Phillips for the murders of Eddie Lynn Ryals, Carl C.J. Justice Jr., Joseph Allen Harden and Daryl Hobson.
They were shot and stabbed to death during a robbery in Ryals’ home in the Carolina Lakes mobile home park in Moore County.
Ryals’ girlfriend, Amanda Cooke Varner, was shot and stabbed but survived.
Renee Yvette McLaughlin and Sean Maurice Ray have been charged with helping Phillips commit the murders and robbery. They are awaiting trial.
As he has throughout the trial, Phillips showed little reaction. He has told the judge he is taking Prozac, an anti-depressant, and Haldol, a drug used to treat psychotic symptoms.
When Judge James Webb had Phillips stand so he could formally give him the four death sentences, Phillips listened for a few moments, then reached down to the table, poured himself a cup of water and drank it while the judge announced the punishments.
The death sentences pleased relatives of the victims.
“I think they all three deserve the death sentence,” said Harvey Hobson, father of Daryl. “All three could have stopped at any time. Either one of them could have persuaded him not to do it, and they didn’t and I think they ought to be put to death.”
Harvey Hobson attended the trial daily since testimony began Sept. 12.
“There ain’t no winners here,” said Belinda Hobson, who was Daryl’s stepmother. “Everybody has lost, including Mario’s mother. And it’s just sad that this happened and we can’t turn back time. We’d love to have our kids back.
Phillips’ mother, Bertie Phillips, also attended every day of the trial. She left the courtroom just before the sentence was announced. In the hall, she leaned heavily on a railing and said she was having trouble breathing. She declined an interview request after the sentencing.
The death sentences disappointed Libby Barnes, a woman who knew Phillips when he was a boy. She testified on his behalf.
“Mario’s a victim, too, of the system. The system that failed him as a child,” Barnes said. She said Phillips and one of his brothers grew up in horrible conditions of neglect and abuse as family members spent most of their time drinking and fighting.
“Not only did those children not have a bed to sleep in, a room to call their own, they had no where to get away from all this adult mayhem that was constantly going on,” Barnes said.
Phillips received four death sentences