By Susan Carroll
The Houston Chronicle
Officer Down: Officer Rodney Johnson
HOUSTON, Texas – In a decision that shocked the family of Houston police officer Rodney Johnson, jurors decided Tuesday that Juan Leonardo Quintero should spend the rest of his life in prison, rather than go to death row, for Johnson’s 2006 murder.
The decision came in the second day of deliberations for the jury, which convicted Quintero of capital murder on May 8 in the court of state District Judge Joan Campbell.
Quintero, 34, had pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.
In a news conference at the Houston Police Officers’ Union, Johnson’s widow, Joslyn Johnson, and other relatives shed tears as they expressed their disappointment and astonishment that Quintero didn’t receive the death penalty.
When the sentence was announced, “I was in awe. I was dumbfounded,” the widow said. “My husband’s life meant nothing, that’s what I felt.’‘
The widow, also an HPD officer, said, “We are very disappointed in the decision that the jury made. If any case ever warranted the death penalty, this certainly did.’‘
Breaking down into tears, she said, “The city lost a hero. I lost my husband.’‘
She said she didn’t agree with the jury’s decision, but wouldn’t criticize the jurors. “They showed mercy on him. He didn’t show mercy on my husband,’’ she said. “God is the ultimate judge, and if he didn’t want this decision to be made, it wasn’t going to be made.’‘
“We’re just very upset,” Lorraine Crawford, mother of Joslyn Johnson, said earlier.
“We wanted the death penalty,” Crawford said. “He had nothing but malice in his heart.”
She added that the jury did not seem to understand the difficulty of a police officer’s job.
The officer’s brother, David Johnson, was in the courtroom with his wife, Donna Mack, when the sentence was announced. He said he and his wife also had wanted to see Quintero sentenced to death.
“He shot him four times in the back, three times in the head,” Johnson said. “I can’t believe that. What’s mitigation?”
Quintero’s relatives left the courtroom without commenting. His wife appeared to be weeping as family members shielded her with their arms as she left the room.
After reading the sentence, Judge Campbell asked Quintero if he had anything to say.
He responded only, “I’m sorry.”
The slain officer’s sister, Susan Johnson, cried as she gave the only victim impact statement. She read, many times in an angry tone, from a piece of paper.
“You are a murderer, plain and simple,” she told Quintero while staring at him.
Johnson was on the stand for about five minutes. Quintero showed no emotion, and for a moment looked down. The judge then admonished him and told him to look at Johnson while she spoke.
Johnson belittled the defense team, looking at them and saying they had manipulated the system, especially with the insanity defense.
She thanked the jurors, some of whom wept while she was reading her statement.
Juror speaks out
Most of the jurors chose not to comment after the trial ended. One, however, acknowledged that she wept during Susan Johnson’s statement.
“I was torn up. I was crying,” said Tiffany Moore, a 38-year-old marketing director from Houston.
“I still feel we came to the right decision,” she said. “We could never bring Rodney back. I feel very sad for the family, losing a loved one.”
Moore said the entire trial was “a very difficult process.”
“I had no idea what I was going into,” she said. “I’m happy with the decision. It was very tense. There was a lot of discussion.”
Moore added that the guilt-innocence phase of the trial had been less difficult for the panel. Even so, she said, she went home and slept for almost a full day after the jury found Quintero guilty on May 8.
Now that the trial is over, she said, she was considering going to work rather than home, because she had fallen so far behind.
Copyright 2008 The Houston Chronicle