HOT SPRINGS -- A Garland County Circuit Court jury deliberated for about 45 minutes Tuesday before sentencing a man to death by lethal injection on two counts of capital murder for the 2015 shooting deaths of his wife and daughter.
Eric Allen Reid, 57, was convicted March 2 after two days of testimony regarding the Oct. 19, 2015, deaths of his wife, Laura J. Reid, 57, and daughter Mary Ann Reid, 32, at their home in Hot Springs.
Reid's sentence is only the second death sentence handed down by a state court in Garland County since the 1950s, after the March 19, 2015, sentencing of Randy William Gay, 57, of Pearcy for a 2011 shooting death. Gay had been convicted of murder twice before for deaths in 1978 and 1991.
Jurors returned Tuesday morning to hear further testimony in Reid's case, including victim impact statements, and closing arguments from the state, represented by chief deputy prosecutor Joe Graham and deputy prosecutor Kara Petro, and Reid's attorney, Willard Proctor Jr. of Little Rock.
Presiding Judge John Homer Wright explained to jurors that they had to weigh the aggravating factors against the mitigating factors to determine if Reid should be put to death or face life in prison without parole, the only two options.
Aggravating factors were the state's contention that Reid knowingly caused the death of more than one person and caused a great risk of death to another person aside from the victims, namely his younger daughter, Heather Reid, who was struck in the arm by a bullet.
Mitigating factors included the defense's contention that Reid was under extreme mental or emotional distress at the time, lacked the capacity to understand his actions or conform them to the law at the time, had no significant prior criminal history, was gainfully employed with a good work history, served in the Navy for 20 years, had multiple health issues requiring medication and has taken courses to improve himself while in jail.
Graham argued that Reid was not mentally disturbed and that the "unusual pressures" the defense cited such as financial problems and child raising "are the same things all couples fight over."
He said the prosecution did not deny many of the mitigating factors cited by the defense existed but told the jury "you must decide the weight to give them" and argued "none of them provide any excuse for what he's done."
Proctor stressed to the jury that Reid will never get out of prison and "will spend the rest of his life in a 8-by-6 cell." He said the burden was on the state to prove death was warranted and otherwise the sentence had to be life in prison.
"If killing Eric Reid could bring back Mary Reid and Laura Reid, no one would argue, but that's not the case," Proctor said.
He told the jurors "life and death are standing face to face here today" and that it was up to them to decide.
"There is one voice, and it's not the loudest voice in the room, it's not the most powerful, it's not even the most compelling, but it's just as important," he said. "That's mercy. Vengeance is screaming for death and mercy says no."
Petro noted in her rebuttal that it was not about vengeance versus mercy, but about "following the procedures and following the law" and said the state had proved its case beyond a reasonable doubt.
Heather Reid, the younger daughter of Eric and Laura Reid, told jurors that she is going to college and thinks about the fact that neither her mother nor her father will see her graduate.
"We are all still reeling from what he did," she said. "I am still healing and trying to grow up myself. Some days it seems like an impossible task."
Heather Reid said she thought it would have been easier to deal with if her mother and sister had died at the hands of a stranger instead of her father, and noted that her father could have divorced her mother or simply left.
"I don't understand why my father did this to us," she said. "There are so many scenarios where we didn't have to lose so much. It didn't have to happen this way."
State Desk on 03/09/2018