Centerville, VA, September 25, 2006--A Goochland County jury last week convicted James Garland Mann of first-degree murder in the July 18, 2005, shooting of Jason Patrick Carr, store manager of the Centerville Stone Mountain's Carpet Outlet, according to the Richmond Times-Dispatch.
Mann, 57, was accused of shooting Carr three times in the back outside Stone carpet outlet. Carr was 27.
Jurors reached their decision after four hours of deliberation on the third day of the trial. They recommended Mann be sentenced to 30 years in prison and fined $100,000. Sentencing was set for Dec. 19.
"Obviously, we're very pleased with the result," Commonwealth's Attorney Claiborne Stokes said outside court. "It showed the good, hard work of the Goochland Sheriff's Office."
Prosecutors established early that there had been bad blood between the two after Mann, a subcontractor for the business, was removed by Carr from the carpet installer list in 2004.
Prosecutors also called several witnesses who claimed Mann had admitted or inferred that he had committed the murder. Mann's daughter, Shannon Haskins, was one of them.
Two days after the slaying, Mann attempted suicide by consuming several dozen sleeping pills. Haskins told the jury that her father had admitted to killing Carr when she found him immediately after the attempt.
"Is this because of Jason?" she said she asked him as they waited for authorities to arrive. She said he nodded yes. "Did you do it?" Again, she said, he nodded yes. She went on to say Mann had frequently mentioned the shooting death, referring to it as a "lapse in judgment."
Defense attorney Todd Stone questioned Haskins' credibility, pointing out that she and her husband, Tommy Haskins, told a different story to a multijurisdictional grand jury and to authorities. Both acknowledged that they had lied, with Shannon claiming it was to protect her father.
"Nobody wants to tell on their family," she said Wednesday.
Deputy Commonwealth's Attorney Nancy Oglesby closed the prosecution's case by pointing to Mann's own words in a suicide letter he left two days after the slaying:
"I could not even face my own anger anymore. I will not endure the indignity of the law."
