CHICAGO — After a four-day trial centered largely on Marcus Floyd’s claims that he could not remember the night Officer Thomas Wortham was killed, a Cook County jury found Thursday that he was, in fact, fit to stand trial for the slaying in 2015.
The jury’s decision means the case will go back to the appellate court, where the higher court judges can consider any claims of error at this week’s fitness trial or other matters Floyd’s attorneys have raised in their appeal of his murder conviction.
Coming to court and reliving Wortham’s killing more than a decade after his death was immensely stressful, his family told reporters after the verdict.
“Every time I hear about someone being killed in Chicago, I think about my son,” said Wortham’s father, Thomas III, a retired Chicago police sergeant. “And it bothers me that in this city so many people are killed, every week, every day. So of course I believe that the people who are the offenders should be treated fairly and get a good day in court, but I’m asking the city at large, what are we doing about all the killings in Chicago?”
Wortham’s sister Sandra told reporters that the wait for a verdict was so tense that she was having a “physical reaction.”
“After people get their day in court, we’ve got to make sure there’s a way to sustain justice for families of victims because it’s unfair to put our physical health at risk,” she said. “... Give people a fair day in court and then let victims rest. There’s got to be a way we can fashion laws to do that.”
In closing arguments Thursday, prosecutors repeatedly stressed that under the law, amnesia about the alleged crime does not necessarily mean someone is unfit for trial. Floyd can understand court proceedings and retain new memories, and his attorneys do not need to rely on his memory to effectively defend him, they argued.
“If Marcus Floyd has amnesia, his memory is not the only source to defend (against) the crime charged,” Assistant State’s Attorney Mary Jo Murtaugh argued. “No evidence of amnesia would impair his ability to defend himself. He’s not handicapped in any way, really, because he claims amnesia.”
Floyd’s attorneys, by contrast, said he would “never ever have a fighting chance” of assisting his attorneys in these specific circumstances, given that he is the only living witness to anything that might have been said between him, Wortham, and Floyd’s cousin Brian, who was also killed in the May 2010 shootout.
“What were they doing that day? Why were you with Brian? Where had you been? Where were you going? Did you know he had a gun? Did you guys have a plan that night? What caused the conversation? Who had what, why did they start shooting, and what was Marcus’s state of mind?” Assistant Public Defender Brendan Max told jurors. “Could Marcus testify about any of this? No. Could he assist his attorney in any of this? No.”
Jurors began deliberating just before 3 p.m. Thursday and took a little less than four hours to reach a decision.
The unusual “retrospective fitness trial” was ordered by a state appellate court, which determined that there were legal errors during the first proceedings in which Floyd was deemed competent to stand trial. Floyd went on to be convicted of murder at trial in 2015.
Prosecutors have alleged that Wortham, 30, was fatally shot as four men tried to rob him of his new motorcycle in front of his parents’ home in the Chatham neighborhood. Wortham drew his gun, identified himself as a cop and the shootout began, according to prosecutors. Wortham’s father, Thomas III, testified that he witnessed the encounter and opened fire in his son’s defense.
Toyious Taylor, driver of the getaway car, and Paris McGee, whom the elder Wortham said fired a shot at him before the two fled, were convicted in 2014 and sentenced to life in prison. Brian Floyd died of injuries suffered in the gunbattle. Marcus Floyd was shot multiple times and was near death.
The lack of oxygen to his brain after the shooting led to severe injury with multiple side effects, including amnesia, Floyd’s attorneys have said.
Earlier Thursday, Herschella Conyers, a longtime attorney and law professor at the University of Chicago, testified that Floyd’s account of what happened that night would be particularly crucial to helping his defense attorney.
“I can only fully appreciate what my defenses might be if I have as full a range of information as possible about critical pieces of evidence,” she said from the witness stand. “What a client knows or intended at the time of the offense, and what a client and only a client knows about who can or cannot corroborate that, becomes integral to providing a defense.”
Conyers does not represent Floyd; rather, she was called to the stand to testify about how Floyd’s amnesia might affect his ability to assist an attorney.
On cross-examination, prosecutors noted that there was copious other evidence available for a defense attorney to examine and investigate as part of preparing a defense.
