Security was back in place for the sentencing phase of the People vs Nicholas McGuffin and the courtroom was packed not just hear the sentence but for other matters preceding the McGuffin case. Throughout the trial a convention had been maintained wherein one half of the front row, the section behind the defendant’s seat was assigned to the family of the defendant and the other half to the prosecution support team and the family of Leah Freeman. More than once during the trial minor territorial disputes came up over possession of the defendant side seats. Because there were no other matters being heard these were all resolved quickly and quietyly.
Today, as the court wound through the earlier matters on the calendar a kerfuffle began over the defendant side front row seats. A woman of heavy stature wearing a reddish shirt prepared to sit in an empty seat being held for the McGuffin family and was told by a family guarding the seats to sit elsewhere because Nick McGuffin was being sentenced. The woman in red threw back her head, copped an attitude by placing a hand on her hip and defiantly announced, “Well, I am the mother of a convicted child molester.” She then promptly sat down in the front row. (I kid you not, this really happened-if only Jon Stewart was here).
A court official already well alerted to territorial issues regarding the McGuffin family from the trial rushed to inform the lady in red that the court, had indeed, reserved these seats and she would have to move. She was seated in the back row. It is amazing that Coos County would be the site of a courtroom argument which family gets a front row seat in a court proceeding. The family of a convicted child molester or a convicted killer? In this instance the convicted killer’s family won out.
Back to the hearing. Shaun McCrea, attorney for Nick McGuffin moved to have the judge reduce the sentence to a 2nd degree manslaughter term of 75 months citing case law that there was no physical evidence of wanton recklessness in the death of Leah Freeman. She argued that Leah Freeman was not a “shrinking violet” and would have fought back but McGuffin had no defensive wounds. Judge Barron denied the motion rightly noting that Freeman’s body was callously dumped over an embankment and left to rot in the summer heat until, after five weeks, only dental records could identify her body.
McGuffin had entered the courtroom with a yellow pad filled top to bottom and left to write with tightly written words. He read from this document between sobs and stated emphatically, “I am innocent, I am innocent, I am innocent” and accused all the witnesses against him of being liars and described himself as a victim of endless persecution throughout society these last eleven years and a scapegoat for the police. He insisted that he would appeal and overturn the verdict and then people would once again look for the real killer of Leah Freeman. He ended with ‘Justice for Leah Freeman’.
The State could have asked for up to twenty years on this Measure 11 crime but did not and settled for the mandatory minimum sentence of ten years, $1,738 in restitution and McGuffin will be on probation for three years once his sentence is served. Will update with details of the proceedings later this afternoon. McGuffin will automatically receive credit for time already served.
The Freeman family was pleased with the sentence.
