Thornton Jury to Start Penalty Deliberations

A year and a half after Westlake nurse Kellie O’Sullivan was abducted and fatally shot, a Ventura County judge turned the death-penalty case over to a jury that has waited more than six months to decide the killer’s fate.

In a sign that jurors are anxious to start deliberating their life-and-death decision, they declined an offer to go home early Thursday afternoon after final arguments by attorneys for defendant Mark Scott Thornton.

Instead, they asked that Superior Court Judge Charles R. McGrath read them 66 pages of jury instructions so deliberations could start first thing this morning.

The jurors have been on the case since September. After waiting nearly six weeks for lawyers to weed out other potential jurors, they heard seven weeks of testimony during the guilt phase of the trial.

Then, after a six-week delay, they heard the seven-week penalty phase that concluded Thursday.

Thornton became eligible for the death penalty in December, when the same jury convicted him of premeditated first-degree murder and a special circumstance that the crime occurred during the commission of a robbery and kidnaping. Prosecutors said Thornton abducted the nurse, forced her to the Santa Monica Mountains and shot her so he could steal her small truck.

The jury has appeared to remain mostly attentive throughout the lengthy trial, which has lasted about two months longer than predicted.

Evidence in the penalty phase of the trial began Jan. 30. The two sides called more than five dozen witnesses, including 46 who took the stand for the defense.

Entitled to the last word in the case, the defense summed up that testimony Thursday, urging the jury to show pity and sentence Thornton to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Deputy Public Defender Susan R. Olson repeated assertions that Thornton suffers from neurological problems and had a tough upbringing.

She also asked the jury not to seek revenge on her client, arguing that its job is to judge the culpability of the defendant. She said the jury had already avenged the murder by finding Thornton guilty of murder and the special circumstance.

“I know there is somebody who is thinking, ‘Well, Kellie O’Sullivan was not granted mercy, so why should Mark Thornton be granted mercy?’ ”

The reason, she argued, is that jurors are mature citizens who have compassion.

“Life in prison without parole is punishment enough for this young man at age 19 for what he did,” she declared.

She also tried to pick apart the prosecution’s case, especially a contention that O’Sullivan was mentally tortured in the 25 minutes or so between the time she was abducted and shot.

In reality, she told jurors, prosecutors do not know what happened between Thornton and O’Sullivan in that span.

The death penalty is designed to exterminate the most evil people from society, Olson said. Despite his crime, Thornton does not fall into that category, she contended.

“This is not a kid who took a loaded gun and decided to go on a crime spree like ‘Natural Born Killers’ in the movies,” she said.

Looking at the 15 jurors, Olson lowered her voice to nearly a whisper and spoke the final words of the long murder trial.

“We’ve been on a long journey,” she said, scanning the jury box. “And I will implore you not to let that journey end in the death of Mark Thornton.”