FORT HOOD, Texas — The Army psychiatrist on trial for the 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood passed on his final chance to address jurors before they started deliberating Thursday, even after prosecutors insisted they reach a verdict that would allow the death penalty.
Maj. Nidal Hasan is acting as his own attorney but declined to plead his case after prosecutors finished their closing argument. When the judge told Hasan he could begin, he said, “The defense chooses not to make a closing statement.”
Prosecutors laid out a detailed road map of their case during their closing argument, saying there was no question that Hasan planned and carried out the attack.
“The facts I laid out to you give you only one option,” the prosecutor, Col. Steve Henricks, told jurors. “The accused without a doubt — without any doubt at all — had a premeditated design to kill.”
Jurors began deliberating the case just before 2 p.m. Thursday.
