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Horn Convicted in Murders Of Ex-Wife, Son and Nurse; Jury Finds
He Conspired With Hit Man:
[FINAL Edition]
Lawrence T. was found guilty on three counts of first-degree
murder and one of murder conspiracy today
by a jury that decided the former Motown recording engineer
hired a Detroit man to execute his former
wife, an overnight nurse and the severely retarded 8-year-old
son whose estate Horn stood to inherit.
Horn, 56, betrayed no emotion as the verdicts were read in a
packed courtroom after 7 1/2 hours of
deliberations. Standing in the blue suit he has worn every day
of the month-long trial, the defendant
shifted his eyes from the jury forewoman only when she answered
"guilty" to the count naming his son.
Trevor Horn left behind a $1.7 million trust fund from a
malpractice settlement that arose from the hospital
incident that left him a quadriplegic. Lawrence Horn was
fighting in civil court to inherit that money when
he was arrested in the murders along with James Edward Perry.
Perry, who purchased a how-to manual
titled "Hit Man" and followed it almost to the letter in Mildred
Horn's Silver Spring home on the night of
March 3, 1993, was sentenced to death three times by a
Montgomery County jury in October.
The Frederick County jury will reassemble on May 13 to decide
Horn's fate. His trial was moved from
Montgomery when Horn exercised his right under state law to move
his death penalty case from the
original jurisdiction.
"There's no joy in this decision, because joy was taken from us
on March the 3rd, 1993," said Terry Krebs,
whose sister Janice Roberts Saunders was 38 the night she rose
from her chair beside Trevor Horn's bed
and was shot in the eye.
"I'm just glad that we got a guilty verdict," said Tiffani Horn,
21, who testified that her father had asked her
to videotape the interior of her mother's house, apparently so
that Horn could acquaint Perry with the
killing ground.
"Not only were my mother and my brother and Janice killed, but
my family was destroyed," Tiffani Horn
said, her voice breaking. "I hope when this is over, we'll be
able to rebuild it, because that's all we have, is
family."
Horn's attorneys declined to comment on the verdict.
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Montgomery Deputy State's Attorney Robert Dean said it brought
"a certain completion and finality" to a
multimillion-dollar three-year investigation that seemed
proportionate to the magnitude of the crime.
The bodies were discovered in the early morning on a cul-de-sac
called Northgate Drive near Bel Pre
Road. Like Saunders, American Airlines flight attendant Mildred
Horn, 43, had been shot in the eye with
a .22-caliber rifle.
The method and caliber were recommended in "Hit Man," whose
publisher is being sued in U.S. District
Court by members of Mildred Horn's family who claim the book
aided the murders. A hearing in U.S.
District Court on whether the First Amendment's free speech
guarantee applies to the book is scheduled
for July 22.
Trevor's body lay amid stuffed animals in his criblike bed, the
shrill alarm on his medical monitor carrying
through the house. An autopsy showed the boy was smothered by
someone who placed one hand over
the tracheostomy opening in his throat and the other hand over
his nose and mouth. Prosecutors said a
blade of grass found on his cheek apparently was left by the
killer.
Lawrence Horn was always the prime suspect, police said. His
divorce from the former Millie Maree had
been bitter, his attitude toward Trevor indifferent. Since being
laid off by Motown in 1990, Horn had fallen
deeply into debt. And even the judge in the hospital malpractice
case told police that Horn had seemedunusually interested in the
size of the settlement.
Horn's whereabouts on the night of the murders only heightened
suspicion: At almost the precise hour the
slayings occurred, he was in his Los Angeles apartment aiming a
video camcorder at the time and date
display of a cable preview channel.
A review of telephone records showed two calls to that apartment
from Montgomery pay phones on the
night of the murders. One was traced to the Days Inn on Shady
Grove Road, where a James Perry had
registered that night.
The discovery launched a massive FBI wiretap and surveillance
effort that turned up Thomas E. Turner, a
Horn cousin who testified, under immunity, that he had
introduced Perry and Horn and served as a go-
between for their contacts after the murders.
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Turner's testimony was buttressed by 709 prosecution exhibits,
mostly telephone records, and an
answering machine tape that captured Perry and Horn talking,
perhaps on the night of the murders.
Krebs, who drives a sedan with vanity plates reading MISUJAN, or
"Miss you, Jan," said it was even more
important to see Horn convicted than Perry.
"He was just a means to an end," she said. "There are many, many
people like Perry out in this world. But
to conceive of a scheme like this, to plan the death of your own
child, to totally disregard the life of an
innocent caregiver like my sister . . .
"He did the unthinkable."
Illustration
ILLUSTRATION,,William J. Hennessy Jr. For Twp CAPTION: Lawrence
T. stands, center, as the verdict
against him is delivered by the jury forewoman, also standing at
left.
Credit: Washington Post Staff Writer
Word count: 877
Copyright The Washington Post Company May 4, 1996
