“Death does not bring peace or renewal to anyone,” she said.
After Pusich finished presenting her final remarks to the jury, the defense followed up with a short rebuttal. DDA Sattler said that he agreed with the defense that the death penalty should be reserved for the “worst of the worst.” He said that Biela fit that category, however, because he had strangled Brianna with a pair of thong underwear.
“He could have used his bare hands. He could have snapped her neck and killed her if he wanted to. He chose not to do that. He killed her in a sick and sadistic way that was directly tied in to what he had done earlier,” Sattler said.
Then the case was given over to the jury. Their task was straightforward and simple; the prosecution had asked the jury to choose the death penalty, and the defense pleaded for their client to be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. There was enough time remaining for the jury to spend a couple of hours of deliberation that evening; then Judge Robert Perry sent them home for the night, with instructions to return the following morning and resume their deliberations again at 8:30
A.M.
The jury had taken around six and a half hours to find James Biela guilty, and the amount of time they were taking on the sentencing phase was running past that when they took a lunch break and ordered sandwiches and salads from the Pub’N’Sub, a restaurant near the courthouse. Their lunch order arrived at approximately the eight-hour mark in their deliberations, but it took only a short time after the jury finished their lunch break and resumed their work for their final verdict to be reached. Court was quickly called back into session; everyone took their places in the courtroom; the verdict was announced. Despite the arguments from his defense team, the jury had decided that James Biela would receive the death penalty.
On their verdict form, the members of the jury said that they realized Biela had endured a hurtful and traumatizing childhood. However, they still agreed with the prosecution’s argument that he should be put to death by lethal injection for Brianna Denison’s rape and murder.
The clerk polled the jury individually. As they answered, one by one, Biela and his attorneys stood, stoically and motionless, as they listened. It seemed as though it took a very long time for each juror to be asked if the death penalty was his or her decision. During that time, Biela never moved. His attorneys occasionally looked over at the jurors or looked down at the floor, but the man who was in the process of receiving a death sentence showed no reaction of any kind. He stood like a statue with his hands folded in front of him, staring straight ahead and occasionally shaking his head slightly, showing none of the emotion that he had displayed earlier when he made his tearful statement to the jury. Like the guilty verdict, it seemed as though it came as no surprise to him or to his defense team.
Following the polling of the jury, Judge Perry made his own statement to the courtroom: “My heart goes out to all the innocent people who have been touched by this tragedy.”
The judge then set a date of July 30 for sentencing on the sexual-assault and kidnapping charges. State law demanded that the jury would determine the sentences in death penalty cases, but Judge Perry would be responsible for deciding the sentences in the other cases himself. Until those other sentences were imposed, Biela would remain in the custody of Washoe County authorities, in the special housing unit at the Washoe County Detention Center.
Biela was handcuffed and led out of the courtroom by a deputy, and others in the room saw that he turned to his family on the way out, telling them not to cry, apologizing to his mother, and saying, “I’m sorry. I fucked up. I love you.”
They called back, “I love you, Jimmy” as he left the room.
Once James Biela left the courtroom, Brianna Denison’s family began to realize that the long nightmare of the trial was finally over and Brianna would, indeed, receive the justice that the entire community was so determined she would have. Some of Brianna’s family members had cried with relief when the sentence was announced. Outside the courtroom, a celebratory air began to take shape. Bridgette Denison hugged the prosecution team and gave several of the courtroom observers the
BRING BRI JUSTICE
buttons, which had been worn by so many people, family, friends, and total strangers during the quest for the apprehension and punishment of Brianna’s killer. All over the courthouse, Brianna’s beautiful, smiling face began to appear on the lapels of people who were elated that Brianna’s killer had finally received the sentence they had been hoping for.
There were many others the Denison/Zunino family members hugged; a great number of law enforcement personnel who had worked so long and hard on the case had been in court that day, and the hallway outside the courtroom was full, with everyone being congratulated and thanked. Retired detective Adam Wygnanski had invested much hard work on the case from the time that he had first sat down across from James Biela, looked him in the eyes, and realized that he was the man the authorities had been searching for.
“Justice was served,” Wygnanski told the media. “The jury had a tough job, and they did it.”
Washoe County DA Richard Gammick told reporters that he was extremely happy with the jury’s decision, saying it was “well-deserved. Cases like this strengthen my faith and belief in the jury system.” Gammick announced a press conference with Brianna’s family that would be held that afternoon. The family had repeatedly told the media that once the verdict was reached and the sentencing was done, they would have statements that they would be making, but they had chosen to wait until the conclusion of the trial and sentencing to speak to the press.
Chapter 25
At the news conference that afternoon, Bridgette Denison said, “Together we lost a beautiful, vibrant, and promising life, and my family and friends have suffered unimaginable tragedy, but we can and will turn this loss into something positive and good. When James Michael Biela messed with my little girl,” she said, “he messed with the wrong families, the wrong group of women, and the wrong city and state.”
Bridgette said that her family, through the BBJF, would continue to work to toughen laws against offenders in an effort to prevent others from experiencing the same heartbreak her family had suffered.
Brianna’s grandmother Carol Pierce said of the verdict, “I didn’t expect that.” It hadn’t set in yet, she said, and added that she would have accepted either a sentence of life without parole or a death sentence.
“As long as you get him off the streets so he doesn’t hurt anybody else,” she said.
“It’s what we wanted,” said Lauren Denison, and Brianna’s maternal grandmother, Barbara Zunino, who earlier had shown kindness and compassion to Biela’s mother after the guilty verdict, said, “It turned out right.”
A statement from Virgie Chin, the woman who was raped by Biela in December 2007, was read by her mother.
A simple thank-you is not enough to convey how I feel,
the young woman had written. She had special thanks for one particular victims’ advocate who had helped her:
for taking such good care of me.
Virgie had decided to become a victims’ advocate herself because of the support she had received from that person, her mother told the people at the press conference.
Don Richter, the founder of the Secret Witness hotline, also spoke about the tip the authorities had received through his organization, the information that had resulted in James Biela finally being positively identified as the man that law enforcement had been so desperately searching for.
“The message we’re trying to get out is that police fight crimes with guns and tear gas, but all you need is a telephone,” he said. He praised all those who had called in tips to the hotline during the long investigation into Brianna’s disappearance and death. He encouraged the community to continue their participation in solving crimes.
Deputy District Attorney Elliott Sattler, the lead prosecutor in the case, commended the jury for their hard work and had praise for the Denison family and the families of the other victims. He saluted the strength they had exhibited throughout the trial.
“It touches you emotionally when you deal with good people, and the three victims in this case were outstanding women,” he said. “It’s gratifying to know that I was a part of producing justice.”
District Attorney Richard Gammick expressed the pride he felt in the law enforcement personnel and the people of the community for working together in such a dedicated and determined manner and bringing about the solution of the two sexual assaults and Brianna’s rape and murder. The case had brought everyone together to get positive results, he said, adding that Brianna’s disappearance had “started one of the most massive manhunts I’ve ever seen for a missing person in this community. Nothing we do here can bring Brianna Denison back, but I think I can stand here now and say we did bring Bri justice. A sexual predator was removed from our midst permanently,” he told the press.
Shortly after the press conference, Biela’s family told the media that his attorneys planned to try and set up a meeting so that they could see him briefly. They also issued a statement:
Our hearts go out to all the families involved in this tragedy. This tragedy has robbed several families of their children and grandchildren, and a son of his father.
After the verdict had been announced, Biela’s mother and stepfather had declined to comment, saying, “Maybe tomorrow.” Later, Kathy Lovell told reporters some of what her son had said to his family.
“He said, ‘Don’t cry.’ He said he loved us,” Biela’s mother said.
After James Biela was sentenced to death, he was placed under suicide watch observation at the Washoe County Jail, Sheriff’s Deputy Armando Avina told the media. The special watch was to ensure that Biela didn’t hurt himself, and he was checked by camera every fifteen minutes. He would remain at the county jail until after the sentencing on the rape and kidnapping charges; then he would be sent to the Northern Nevada Correctional Center for a twenty-one-day intake process, then on to Ely State Prison, where more than eighty other death row inmates were all housed.
Chief deputy public defender John Petty had already been tapped to handle Biela’s first series of appeals, and Petty told the media that all capital murder cases in Nevada automatically went to the state supreme court for review. Petty said that he planned to submit a notice of appeal immediately after Judge Perry sentenced Biela and entered his written judgment.
“That’s because the defense wants the supreme court to review all five of the charges,” he said, “not just the murder. We want to ensure that we are able to raise issues in the other counts.”
Petty said that he had not yet reviewed the trial transcripts, but one issue that concerned him was whether or not there had been sufficient evidence to convict Biela on the sexual-assault charges.
Petty said that after the case record was sent to the supreme court, his office would have sixty days to file its opening brief, with the option of a sixty-day extension. Prosecutors had forty-five days following that time to file their response; public defenders would then have forty-five days to respond. Petty said that the briefing process should be complete by the end of that year, and could possibly be ready for consideration by the supreme court by January of the following year. The justices would then decide whether or not they would allow oral arguments. If the defenders were to lose in the supreme court, Petty said, the case would be sent to a different group of lawyers that would then start an appeals process in Washoe County District Court.
Between the end of James Biela’s murder trial and his sentencing hearing on the additional rape charges he had been convicted of, a long, unpleasant exchange occurred that had taken place back and forth between Judge Robert Perry and District Attorney Richard Gammick concerning a remark Gammick was said to have made about Biela’s guilty verdict.
Judge Perry was sharply critical of Gammick after hearing that the district attorney had been quoted in the
Reno Gazette-Journal
as saying that
“some people say that decision day is better than sex.”
Judge Perry promptly issued a court order to reprimand the district attorney for his comment, saying that the remark, comparing a guilty verdict to sex,
undermines public confidence and respect in the criminal justice system,
and was highly inappropriate. Gammick then filed a motion asking that the judge withdraw his court order, but Perry issued a second court order refusing to recant his criticism. He would not order sanctions against Gammick, he said, but neither would he take back his original reprimand. Perry continued to say that such inappropriate and unprofessional statements made by those in the legal profession not only could cause appeals, but also were detrimental to the public’s respect for the legal system.
Learning of the court order, Gammick said that he disagreed with the judge, saying, “We’ll leave it lie and see what develops.” He added that he and the judge “have a history.”
For Gammick to say the two men had “a history” was quite an understatement, and it quickly became evident that neither was willing to “leave it lie.” It seems that in the 2008 elections, DDA Elliott Sattler had run against Judge Perry. Gammick and Perry engaged in an e-mail feud during the campaign, with Gammick claiming that Perry had made false statements about Sattler. Gammick also went so far as to accuse Perry of using cocaine.
Perry responded to the e-mails with an attack of his own, accusing Gammick of trying to muddy the waters in order to disguise what he called Sattler’s inexperience and his lack of qualifications for the judgeship. Perry won the election, and a six-year term on the bench.
Between the time that Biela was found guilty and before his sentencing, the Gammick-Perry feud was renewed with vigor when Gammick made the remark to the newspaper about decision day being “better than sex.” During the height of the dispute, Gammick wrote a letter to the editor of the
Reno Gazette-Journal,
claiming that he was only repeating a quote from a former district attorney, Mills Lane, who allegedly had once said that a guilty verdict was better than sex. Gammick claimed that he had repeated Lane’s remark during a private conversation with reporter Siobhan McAndrew, who had written the story.
An experienced and highly professional reporter, McAndrew stood by her story. She countered Gammick’s claims by stating that the conversation had not been a private one; she had been obviously acting as a reporter at the time, since she was asking questions and writing Gammick’s answers in the notebook she was carrying. The entire conversation had taken place in the Washoe County Courthouse’s media room following the announcement of Biela’s guilty verdict, she said.
A few weeks later, on June 25, Judge Perry prepared and released a court order dealing with the disclosure of personal jury information. Following the release of the court order, Perry told the media that he felt it necessary to remind all the attorneys in the case that they were required to follow Nevada’s Rules of Professional Conduct. He said that the “better than sex” comment had been highly inappropriate and that such a remark could even lead to an appeal of the verdict.
Gammick was not pleased to have been singled out by the judge once again for criticism and censure. He filed a motion four days later asking Perry to revise his order and leave out mention of his comment. Judge Perry might have “misapprehended” the situation, Gammick said, and complained that he didn’t see how his remark could be grounds for an appeal. It was made outside the hearing of the jury or the judge, and was supposedly off the record, Gammick said. He claimed that Nevada’s Rules of Professional Conduct forbade statements that might affect a legal proceeding, or
have a substantial likelihood of heightening public condemnation of the accused.
Gammick clearly believed that his comment had been innocuous and would not have affected the case. He said that the jury had been ordered not to read or view any news items, so what he said to McAndrew— in what he claimed had been a private conversation—could not have had any bearing on the jury’s decision in the penalty phase of the trial. And in closing his motion with one last word on the subject, Gammick said that his remarks were not specifically about Biela, so there was no question of slanting public opinion against him.
In response to this, an obviously angered Judge Perry issued a second court order:
The victims in this case were forcibly subjected to sexual assault. To imply that some people, arguably including [Gammick], would receive satisfaction comparable to sex from a guilty verdict in such a case was thoughtless and could be viewed as disrespectful by at least some rape victims and their families.
Perry went on to state that it was his belief that Gammick had undermined the seriousness of the cases against Biela by his remark:
This litigation was not a game. Neither was there anything remotely funny about what happened to the victims nor in the thoughtful imposition of the death penalty by the jury.
It was a great credit to both Judge Perry and to District Attorney Gammick that they did not allow their animosity toward one another to have any bearing on the Biela trial. Both men managed to put their personal differences aside in the courtroom during the period of the trial and conducted themselves with the highest professional standards, working together to ensure a fair, unbiased trial and bringing justice for the victims and their families.
While the Gammick-Perry feud was taking place, with statements, motions, and court orders volleying back and forth, a much more cordial and productive meeting was taking place between Nevada Democrat senator Harry Reid and Bridgette Denison. Reid wanted to talk with Brianna’s mother about the Katie Sepich Enhanced DNA Collection Act of 2010, which increased Byrne grants for states that undertake DNA sample collection programs for people who are placed under arrest for committing violent crimes.
The Edward J. Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant (JAG) Program originates from the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Justice Programs, Bureau of Justice Assistance. The JAG Program is authorized by the Omnibus Crime Control and Safe Streets Act of 1968, as amended, and was designed to provide seed money to support a broad range of activities to prevent and control crime based on local needs and conditions.
One of these many activities supported by the Byrne grants was the funding of DNA collection of those arrested for violent crimes in eligible states. Bridgette had been lobbying the state legislature for the passage of a similar bill to require DNA collection from those arrested for violent crimes in Nevada, which would make Nevada eligible for the increased Byrne funding.
Reid said that he felt that what had happened to Brianna was “an absolute tragedy. I believe we must do more to capture DNA samples from criminals, and I respect her mother’s efforts to honor her daughter’s memory by advocating for law enforcement funding that will save lives by identifying violent offenders earlier through DNA cataloging. I encourage the state legislature to pass a bill in their next session that will enable Nevada law enforcement to collect samples from violent offenders, so we don’t have to lose another bright, young Nevadan like Brianna.”