ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — The leader of a self-styled Bonnie and Clyde couple who staged a brazen prison escape and a three-week crime spree has been convicted of capital murder in the gruesome slayings of a retired Oklahoma couple who crossed their path on an eastern New Mexico highway.
John McCluskey was found guilty Monday of murder, carjacking and other charges in the August 2010 deaths of Gary and Linda Haas of Tecumseh, Okla., who were making their annual summer trek to Colorado.
The same jurors will return to decide whether McCluskey, 48, should be sentenced to death or life in prison.
Hass family members, who sat through four weeks of testimony, showed little emotion when the verdict was read.
Linda Rook, the younger sister of Gary Haas, called McCluskey's conviction on 20 counts good news.
Asked if she was relieved, Gary Haas's mother, Vivian Haas, said, "not enough."
"I think she is still hopeful for the final decision," Rook said of her mother's guarded reaction. The family, she said, is waiting on the penalty phase, when it will testify in support of a death sentence.
Attorneys declined comment, noting that the trial is ongoing as jurors have to return for what is expected to be weeks of more testimony on whether McCluskey should be executed.
McCluskey showed no emotion as the guilty verdicts were read. He was serving 15 years for attempted second-degree murder, aggravated assault and discharge of a firearm when he and two other prisoners escaped from a medium-security prison near Kingman, Ariz., in July 2010 with the help of his cousin and fiancee, Casslyn Welch.
One of the inmates was quickly captured after a shootout with authorities in Colorado, while McCluskey, Welch and inmate Tracy Province headed to New Mexico. Their escape and ensuing crimes sparked a nationwide manhunt and an Interpol alert.
John McCluskey was found guilty Monday of murder, carjacking and other charges in the August 2010 deaths of Gary and Linda Haas of Tecumseh, Okla., who were making their annual summer trek to Colorado.
The same jurors will return to decide whether McCluskey, 48, should be sentenced to death or life in prison.
Hass family members, who sat through four weeks of testimony, showed little emotion when the verdict was read.
Linda Rook, the younger sister of Gary Haas, called McCluskey's conviction on 20 counts good news.
Asked if she was relieved, Gary Haas's mother, Vivian Haas, said, "not enough."
"I think she is still hopeful for the final decision," Rook said of her mother's guarded reaction. The family, she said, is waiting on the penalty phase, when it will testify in support of a death sentence.
Attorneys declined comment, noting that the trial is ongoing as jurors have to return for what is expected to be weeks of more testimony on whether McCluskey should be executed.
McCluskey showed no emotion as the guilty verdicts were read. He was serving 15 years for attempted second-degree murder, aggravated assault and discharge of a firearm when he and two other prisoners escaped from a medium-security prison near Kingman, Ariz., in July 2010 with the help of his cousin and fiancee, Casslyn Welch.
One of the inmates was quickly captured after a shootout with authorities in Colorado, while McCluskey, Welch and inmate Tracy Province headed to New Mexico. Their escape and ensuing crimes sparked a nationwide manhunt and an Interpol alert.