A Mississippi man convicted of killing eight people spoke in court Thursday, blaming the devil for his actions and asking jurors not to sentence him to death.
Willie Cory Godbolt gave a rambling speech full of religious references, and at one point a spectator sitting among the victims' families yelled at him to shut up, the Enterprise-Journal reported.
Godbolt said he had prayed to be a better man, “but the devil came to kill and destroy. He wasn’t going to let that be.”
Defendant Willie Cory Godbolt reacts as he listens to discussion during the penalty phase of his capital murder trial, Wednesday, Feb. 26, 2020 at the Pike County Courthouse in Magnolia, Miss. Godbolt, 37, is on trial, for the May 2017 shooting deaths of eight people in Brookhaven. (Donna CampbellThe Daily Leader via AP, Pool)
Godbolt, 37, was convicted Tuesday of four counts of capital murder, which could carry the death penalty, and four counts of murder, which are punishable by life in prison. In Mississippi, the death penalty can only be ordered by a jury, not a judge. If jurors cannot agree unanimously on the death penalty, the judge will sentence Godbolt to life in prison on the capital murder convictions.
The same jurors who convicted Godbolt are deciding on the death penalty. On Wednesday, they heard from victims' relatives, including the widow of a deputy sheriff who was shot to death while responding to a domestic disturbance call and the mother of a teenager who was killed at another home.
Investigators said that on May 27, 2017, Godbolt went to his in-laws' home and argued with his estranged wife about their children. The deputy, Godbolt's mother-in-law and two other people were killed there. In the early hours of the next day, two young people were killed in a second house, and a married couple was killed in a third house.
"My life came to a screeching halt,” Godbolt said Thursday, describing that night. “I couldn’t fight the battle that was raging inside me.”
He quoted words spoken by Jesus on the cross: “'My Lord, My Lord, why hast thou forsaken me?'”
He said he thought his daughter was in in danger from other relatives, and a woman in the audience screamed; “Cory, just shut up! Just stop!”
Circuit Judge David Strong halted proceedings and family members were led out of the courtroom.
Dr. Matt Mendel, a clinical psychologist from Raleigh, North Carolina, testified Thursday that he interviewed Godbolt and several of his relatives on behalf of the defense. When Godbolt was 17, his stepmother shot and killed his father, which “led to enormous anger and resentment, especially toward women,” Mendel said.