Jurors deliberating on life in prison or death in Dugan trial

Prosecutors seek death penalty while defense argue for life in prison

Brian Dugan deserves nothing less than the death penalty for brutally murdering 10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico in 1983, DuPage County prosecutors said this evening just before jurors began deliberating his fate.

"There's only one punishment that truly fits this crime. Send him to Death Row," DuPage County State's Attorney Joseph Birkett urged jurors who will decide whether Dugan receives the death penalty or is sentenced to life in prison.

The jury began deliberating about 5:10 p.m. following daylong closing arguments and an unusual five-week sentencing hearing that delved into virtually every detail regarding the Naperville girl's slaying.

Immediately after jurors began their deliberations, Nicarico's parents and other relatives thanked police, prosecutors, community residents and even Dugan's other crime victims for the help they have provided.

"We must express our profound gratitude for the tireless support that we have received from family, friends and the community at large since 1983," Jeanine's father, Tom Nicarico, said, flanked by his wife, Pat, and their two surviving daughters, Chris and Kathy. "They have given us the strength and resilience to get through the seemingly endless twists and turns of the past quarter century."

Several other women who were attacked by Dugan also have attended the hearing -- and offered their support to the Nicaricos.

"Words do not convey the gratitude and empathy we feel toward those very brave women--Dugan's surviving victims -- who came forward and testified during these proceedings," Nicarico said.

"They tore off the scabs from the emotion and psychological wounds, which they have been trying to heal for many years," Nicarico said. "They exposed the rawness of their very personal pain and revisited humiliation and inner fears in an effort to ease ours."

Jeanine was kidnapped from her home Feb. 25, 1983 on a day she stayed home sick from school. The dark-haired fifth grader was raped, then fatally bludgeoned and left along the Illinois Prairie Path.

Dugan, indicted for the slaying in 2005, pleaded guilty in July to the murder.

The five-man, seven-woman jury must agree unanimously to impose a death sentence on the 53-year-old Dugan, who already is serving life sentences for two other murders. If jurors can't reach a unanimous verdict, Dugan will receive another life prison sentence.

Some of the evidence presented during the lengthy sentencing hearing came from Dugan himself, though he never took the witness stand.

Instead, prosecutors and defense attorneys played recordings of interviews Dugan, now 53, previously had given to mental health experts.

Dugan spoke for hours to a prison psychologist in 1986, calmly describing how he killed 27-year-old Donna Schnorr in 1984 and followed that in 1985 by kidnapping and killing 7-year-old Melissa Ackerman of Somonauk.

Sitting in the courtroom today with the Nicaricos were Donna Schnorr's brother, Roger, and Opal Horton, who was with Melissa Ackerman when she was grabbed by Dugan, but escaped Melissa's fate.

Earlier this year, Dugan in an interview with a defense mental health expert described how he abducted, raped and then murdered Jeanine after breaking into her parents' home on a day the fifth grader stayed home sick from school.

Dugan in that interview compared himself to a famous literary villain, saying he "turned into Mr. Hyde from Dr. Jekyll" and couldn't stop himself from killing Jeanine, even though he hadn't planned to do so and knew he his actions were wrong.

"I couldn't stop," Dugan told forensic psychologist Kent Kiehl, who testified on Dugan's behalf.

Kiehl and other mental health experts called by defense attorneys testified that Dugan is a psychopath who lacks empathy and has extreme difficulty in controlling his violent impulses.

Citing Dugan's troubled mental state, defense attorneys asked jurors to sentence him to life in prison, saying he will remain locked away from any potential victims.

"He's never leaving prison, he's never going to be walking among us," said DuPage County Public Defender Robert Miller, one of Dugan's court-appointed attorneys.

Defense attorneys also have argued that Dugan took responsibility for Jeanine's murder by pleading guilty voluntarily and that he had offered years ago to admit he killed the youngster, even though two other men already had been convicted of her murder.

Those two men, Rolando Cruz and Alejandro Hernandez, spent years in prison for Jeanine's murder before ultimately being freed. A third man, Stephen Buckley, also was charged, but was never convicted of Jeanine's death.

Prosecutors, though, argued Dugan several times declined to talk to investigators about the slaying and even mentioned in letters from the DuPage County Jail that Cruz, Hernandez and Buckley also were there after being arrested for Jeanine's killing.

"He could care less about Cruz, Hernandez and Buckley," said prosecutor Michael Wolfe. "There couldn't be a better cover for him."