Opinion ID: 1907203
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 27

Heading: Prior Murderers with Two Additional Aggravating Factors or Particular Violence/Terror: B(1)

Text: A) George Booker (1 and 2) On September 11, 1985, George Booker was asked to leave the home of friends, a married couple with whom he had been living. He had been having an affair with the wife. Booker went to the home of a female friend where he sexually assaulted her at knife point. He then took her car and ran down a male pedestrian, stopped to steal the ailing pedestrian's wallet, and drove away. On September 13, 1985, police officers responded to a suspicious-person call and canvassed the neighborhood. They entered the home of an elderly woman when they discovered the door to the home ajar, and saw Booker heading down the stairs toward them with a knife in hand. After refusing to drop the knife and attempting to grab one of the officer's guns, Booker was wrestled to the ground and arrested. In response to questioning, Booker told police that he had killed two women, but that it might have been just a dream. On September 14, 1985, however, the bodies of two women were discovered in their home. One victim was tied up and gagged, and had a cord around her neck. Her mouth and forehead had been bashed in. The cause of death was suffocation, strangulation, or head injuries. The other victim was also gagged and suffered knife cuts on her chest, abdomen, throat and over her left eye. There was a defense wound on her right hand. The cause of death was multiple stabbings, twice in the throat and once in the back. The State theorized that Booker had raped, sodomized and killed the first victim before the second victim got home. When the second victim arrived, Booker forced her to undress and lie next to the first victim's body on the bed. He then handcuffed the second victim to the first victim's body before stabbing the second victim to death. Booker claimed diminished capacity at trial, asserting that he was drunk and high on numerous narcotics. At the time of his crime spree, Booker was thirty-six years old, an alcoholic and a high school drop-out. One of eleven children born to sharecropper parents, Booker's father regularly beat him, his siblings and his mother. Although Booker never received psychiatric care, such care had been recommended for him in the past and a psychiatrist for the defense testified that Booker was experiencing a psychotic episode, exacerbated by his consumption of alcohol and drugs, at the time of the offenses. The psychiatrist also testified that Booker had an I.Q. of eighty and that mental tests suggested brain damage. His extensive criminal record includes a conviction for murder in 1972, two robberies, and terroristic threats, aggravated assault, and disorderly persons offenses. The jury convicted Booker of two counts of knowing murder, aggravated sexual assault and possession of a weapon for an unlawful purpose. For the murder of the first victim, the jury found four aggravating factors: c(4)(a) (prior murder), c(4)(c) (extreme suffering/torture), c(4)(g) (felony murder). For the murder of the second victim, the jury found three aggravating factors: c(4)(a) (prior murder), c(4)(c) (extreme suffering), and c(4)(f) (escape detection). For both murders, at least one juror found the c(5)(a) (extreme mental and emotional disturbance) and c(5)(h) (catch-all) mitigating factors. Because the jury could not reach a unanimous decision regarding the weighing of the factors for either murder, Booker was sentenced to two life terms, each with a mandatory minimum of thirty years, to run consecutively. The aggravated sexual assault merged with the murders and, on the weapons offense, Booker was sentenced to a concurrent ten-year term.