OLATHE, Kan. — A jury Tuesday recommended the death penalty for a white supremacist who fatally shot three people at Jewish sites in Kansas last year, hours after the man told jurors he didn’t care what sentence was handed down.
The same jury convicted Frazier Glenn Miller Jr., 74, last week of capital murder in the April 2014 shootings. The judge overseeing the trial will decide whether to follow the jury’s sentencing recommendation.
Johnson County District Attorney Steve Howe had urged the jury to recommend a death sentence during closing arguments Tuesday in the trial’s penalty phase. He showed jurors one of the shotguns used in the shootings, saying Miller — who repeatedly admitted to the killings — pointed the gun at one of the victims, Terri LaManno, 53, but the weapon didn’t fire.
Howe then grabbed another of Miller’s guns, saying LaManno “begged for her life” before Miller shot her.
“There’s no doubt she was terrified. She froze. … And his response was to brutally kill her,” Howe said. “The defendant’s actions are clearly the type of case the death penalty was made for.”
Miller also killed William Corporon, 69, and Corporon’s 14-year-old grandson, Reat Griffin Underwood, at the Jewish Community Center in Overland Park. He shot LaManno later that day at the nearby Village Shalom retirement center.
Miller’s sentencing is scheduled for Nov. 10.
