ALEXANDRIA, Louisiana (AP) — A federal jury Monday convicted a Mississippi man who was declared dead two decades ago, only to resurface as a murder suspect.
The Town Talk reports jurors took just over an hour before finding Thomas Sanders guilty in the kidnapping and slaying of Lexis Roberts, a 12-year-old girl whose remains were discovered in the Catahoula Parish woods in October 2010.
The penalty phase begins next week when jurors will decide whether Sanders will be put to death or spend the rest of his life in prison.
Prosecutors concluded their case against Sanders Friday, and defense lawyers called no witnesses after failing to get the case thrown out of federal court.
Jurors convicted Sanders, 57, of both counts he faced — kidnapping resulting in death and using a firearm in a violent crime that resulted in death.
The defense team faced a daunting task, given what prosecutor Bill Flanagan referred to Monday as an “ocean of evidence” against Sanders.
Sanders confessed to killing the young girl and her mother, Suellen Roberts, to multiple law enforcement officers. In a taped interview with an FBI agent, he says “I made (Lexis) get in the car” after shooting her mother.
Sanders gave law enforcement officers detailed information that led to the discovery of Suellen Roberts’ body. His description of the little girl’s killing was matched exactly by the wounds on her body.
When Sanders was arrested in Gulfport, Mississippi, in November 2010, he was driving the woman’s car. Inside were a rifle that matched the type used to shoot the daughter and a knife with her DNA on the blade.
“This was an execution,” Flanagan said during closing statements Monday
“Most of all, you know she did not deserve one minute of the horror Thomas Steven Sanders put her through,” Flanagan said of the child. “You know she did not deserve to suffer a violent, brutal death at the hands of Mr. Sanders.”
Sanders’ attorneys acknowledged from the trial’s start that he killed both the mother and daughter. They hitched their case to disputing he committed any federal crimes, and arguing he should be tried in state court rather than U.S. District Court.
U.S. District Judge Dee Drell denied a defense motion for acquittal, turning away those arguments.
Sanders, who wiped away tears at some points during the trial, showed little emotion after the verdict was read. He hugged his attorney, Rebecca Hudsmith, spoke what appeared to be encouraging words in her ear, then shook hands with his other attorneys before being led away.
Court reconvenes next Tuesday at 9:30 a.m., when the penalty phase of the trial begins.
Prosecutors have said Sanders shot Suellen Roberts on a trip all three took to a wildlife park in Arizona, then drove Lexis Roberts to Louisiana, where he shot her four times and cut her throat. They said after visiting a wildlife refuge known as Bearizona and stopping at the Grand Canyon, the trio pulled into a remote stretch of desert off an interstate so Suellen Roberts could shoot Sanders’ .22-caliber rifle. Instead, Sanders shot the mother in the head while her daughter sat on a blanket nearby, Flanagan said.
Sanders left the body where it fell and drove Lexis Roberts over several days to northeast Louisiana, where he shot her three times in the head and once in the chest, the prosecutor said. With the girl still alive, prosecutors said Sanders then cut her throat with a knife. Two experts testified Friday that DNA from the blade of a knife found in Sanders’ possession matched DNA samples taken from Lexis Roberts’ remains.
Sanders was identified as a suspect long after he was thought dead. Sanders had left his family in Mississippi in 1987, and his relatives and ex-wife had him declared dead in 1994 after he had been missing for years.
