SHEPHERDSVILLE, Ky.—As his chief accuser testified in Kentucky courtroom, Michael Dale St. Clair sat silently, letting his opportunity for a face-to-face confrontation pass.
St. Clair, facing a possible death sentence in the 1991 slaying of Francis “Frank” Brady of Bardstown, opted Tuesday to let his attorneys question 51-year-old Dennis Gene Reese.
The hearing that began Monday came after months of blustering in interviews and letters to The Associated Press about wanting an opportunity to question his one-time co-defendant and represent himself at a resentencing hearing.
It’s the latest attempt by prosecutors to put St. Clair on death row and make the sentence stick. Since first being convicted in Kentucky in 1998, the Kentucky Supreme Court has returned St. Clair for either a new trial or sentencing three times, most recently in April 2010, when it upheld his conviction but overturned the death sentence.
Because only the penalty is in question, jurors were being asked only to decide if St. Clair should be sentenced to death or life in prison, not his guilt in the crime. St. Clair also faces a retrial in Brady’s death in neighboring Hardin County, after the Kentucky Supreme Court overturned the conviction there.
Reese is an Oklahoma inmate serving life in prison without parole for killing a woman in that state as well as sentences of life without parole for 25 years in Kentucky for the death of Brady, who disappeared from a rest stop on Interstate 65 near Elizabethtown, Ky. His remains were later found in neighboring Bullitt County near Lebanon Junction.
Reese is a thin, pale man who wore a blue shirt that hid multiple tattoos, including one of Charles Manson’s autograph.
During his testimony, Reese laid out a story of how he and St. Clair escaped from a jail in Durant, Okla., in September 1991, and went on a multi-state crime and killing spree through Texas, Colorado, New Mexico, Louisiana and Tennessee that ended with Brady’s death in October 1991.
The pair split up after a confrontation with Kentucky State Police, with St. Clair being captured in December 1991 and Reese, the only living witness to the pair’s travels, being caught in Las Vegas in January 1992.
Under questioning from Assistant Attorney General Todd Lewis, Reese told jurors how the pair stole a truck from a family in Oklahoma, fled to Texas and eventually bought bus tickets to Portland, Ore. The men became paranoid that the bus drivers would recognize them because of national publicity about their escape, so they abandoned the bus in Englewood, Colo.
The pair used a ruse to kidnap 22-year-old Timothy Keeling in Colorado and steal his truck, Reese said. After driving for nearly 14 hours, St. Clair told Reese to pull over in rural New Mexico and got Keeling out of the truck, too, Reese said.
“I heard two gun shots,” Reese said. “Michael got back in the truck.”
“Where’s Tim?” Lewis asked as St. Clair stared at the prosecutor.
“Killed,” Reese said. “He told me somebody had to look out for us … that shooting people was like shooting dogs. Once you killed one, the rest was easy.”
Neither man has been prosecuted in that case.
Reese’s testimony took jurors through the Dallas area to New Orleans and on to Tennessee and Kentucky, where the men met Brady. Reese said the pair kidnapped Brady with the aim of stealing his truck. The men then drove to a rural area near Lebanon Junction where St. Clair told Brady they would free him while they escaped.
“A couple minutes later, I hear two gunshots,” Reese said. “He told me he shot him once in the chest, and once in the face.”
Reese said St. Clair, already sentenced to two life sentences in Oklahoma for murder, showed no remorse after the Oct. 6, 1991, killing.
“It was like a joke to him, he was happy-go-lucky,” Reese said. “I was thinking, ‘Man, what did I get myself into?'”
As Reese testified, the portly St. Clair, dressed in a dark suit, gray shirt and gold tie, chatted with his attorneys and stared at Lewis, whom he has expressed animosity toward in interviews. During breaks in the testimony, Reese stared at St. Clair, who wouldn’t return the looks.
In interviews and letters over 18 months, St. Clair accused Reese of killing Brady, denied killing Keeling and repeated a desire to question his one-time co-defendant with a pledge to expose him as a liar.
St. Clair also expressed indifference to what the sentence in his case turns out to be, figuring he’ll die before the executioner comes calling.
“Mother Nature has first mortgage on my death,” St. Clair told the AP. “She’ll be collecting before the Commonwealth will.”
