Fla. Jury Urges Death for Killer of 5 College Students

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — It took a jury only one vote Thursday to decide that serial killer Danny Harold Rolling should be sentenced to death for a string of gruesome sex murders that terrorized this college town four years ago, a juror said.

The jury’s only other option was to sentence Rolling to life in prison. Circuit Judge Stan R. Morris will hear comments from Rolling and receive written statements from the victims’ families on Tuesday before deciding whether to impose the jury’s recommendation.

Rolling, a 39-year-old drifter from Shreveport, La., pleaded guilty Feb. 15 to five counts of first-degree murder. He clenched his teeth when the verdict was read and stared at each juror as they were polled. He appeared to blink away tears several times.

In closing arguments Wednesday, the prosecutor portrayed Rolling as a calculated killer; his public defender said Rolling was mentally ill and had endured years of physical and emotional abuse from his father.

Brenda Diaz, one of the jurors, said the nearly 5 1/2 hours of deliberations were difficult. “As horrific as what he did was, he is still a life,” she said.

Even so, she said, the jury only took one vote--and it was unanimous.

“We all cried when we took the vote and heard the word ‘death’ over and over. It was not a task we took lightly,” she said.

The jury heard more than two weeks of testimony about the slayings, mutilations and rapes of the students; Rolling’s family life and childhood; his mental health; and tapes of Rolling’s confessions and songs he has written.

Relatives of Rolling’s five victims said they were pleased with the verdict, but fear their suffering will be forgotten.

“We continue to be haunted with the fear that people will remember this killer, even glorify him for the slaughter of our children,” they said in a statement read in court.

The college students were slain in their off-campus apartments in August, 1990, just before the fall semester. Rolling beheaded one of his victims.

Gladys Taboada, the mother of victim Manuel Taboada, wept at the verdict. Her son was stabbed 31 times. “It has not ended,” she said. “It will never end.”