Atlanta courthouse shooting suspect plotted escape, officials say
By
BETH WARREN ,
RHONDA COOK
Cox News Service
Thursday, November 17, 2005
ATLANTA Brian Nichols plotted his escape from the Fulton County Jail with a fellow inmate accused of fatally shooting a toddler, according to officials familiar with the letters exchanged between the two.
Sheriff's officials say the letters were discovered last week during a check of the inmates' cells. Nichols, facing multiple murder charges in the March 11 courthouse shootings, possessed one that "made reference to an escape plan," including overpowering deputies and releasing other inmates. The identity of Nichols' pen pal, however, was not disclosed.
But officials familiar with the incident, but who asked not to be named, said Wednesday that Nichols wrote to Stephen Marshall, 34, who is awaiting trial on charges in the 2004 fatal shooting of 3-year-old Terrance Douglas of East Point. The officials did not say whether Nichols and Marshall knew each other before Nichols' March 12 arrest on charges he gunned down a judge and three others.
Since his arrest, Nichols has been held in a third-floor cell in the medical section of the Fulton County Jail, said sheriff's spokeswoman Nikita Adams-Hightower. About 40 to 50 inmates are in the area, with five or six considered dangerous or escape risks. At any given time, there are three or four deputies watching those high-risk inmates.
The back and two sides of their cells are cinder block and the wall to the common area is glass with a metal door. Sound cannot escape the cells so it is virtually impossible for inmates to talk to one another, Adams-Hightower said. Inmates in those cells are allowed out only for meetings with attorneys, visits with friends and relatives, showers and one hour of daily exercise.
Since discovery of the letters, the Sheriff's Department has increased security around Nichols and Marshall. When asked Wednesday about Nichols' alleged escape plan, Sheriff Myron Freeman would only say, "He's not going anywhere."
Adams-Hightower, who would not confirm the identity of the second inmate, said it was not known if Nichols' writings reached the inmate via mail or if a Sheriff's Department employee delivered it personally for Nichols. "That's being investigated," the spokeswoman said.
Police say Marshall was drinking, smoking marijuana and playing with a 9 mm semi-automatic pistol Jan. 5, 2004, when it went off and sent a bullet ripping into Terrance's face and out the back of the child's head. Marshall, who was acquitted of an earlier unrelated murder, insists he isn't the one who shot the child, said his attorney, Chuck Rooks.
Some witnesses told police that Marshall wiped his gun clean and ran launching a manhunt that led to Cleveland. Marshall was arrested nine days later hiding in his uncle's house. Then-Sheriff Jackie Barrett flew to Ohio with two of her employees to personally bring Marshall to the Fulton jail.
Rooks said Marshall ran because he didn't trust the justice system not because he was guilty of murder.
Marshall, who also had served five years in jail for an unrelated armed robbery, was a convicted felon who wasn't supposed to have a gun and realized he would be heading back to jail, his attorney said.
Marshall pleaded guilty in federal court to felony possession of a firearm by a convicted felon related to the child's death. He was ordered to serve 20 years in a federal prison, but remains at the Fulton County Jail while awaiting state murder charges.
Also Wednesday, the judge in the Nichols case held a closed hearing at the downtown Atlanta courthouse. No one emerging after the 65-minute hearing would discuss Nichols, his alleged escape plans or the topic of the hearing in Judge Hilton Fuller's temporary office at the courthouse.
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