Jury Split On Rape, Murder Sentence

A jury Thursday handed down a 25-year prison term for a man convicted of raping a 13-year-old boy, but split on sentencing him for first-degree murder.

The 12-member panel had returned the murder verdict earlier in the day, sparing Joshua Macabe Brown, 23, of the death penalty in the 1999 slaying of Jesse Dirkhising. Brown was convicted of rape on Wednesday.

After the murder verdict was delivered, the jury retired to consider sentencing on both charges. The rape charge carried two possible prison sentences: 10 to 40 years or life.

Jurors Thursday split 11-1 on the murder sentence, which could range up to life.

Brown originally was charged with capital murder, for which he faced the death penalty, but the jury deadlocked on convicting him of that and instead returned a first-degree murder verdict.

Jesse was allegedly drugged, bound, gagged, raped and sodomized in 1999 at the apartment Brown shared with his gay lover, Davis Don Carpenter, 39. Prosecutors said the boy suffocated because of the drugs and the way he was trussed up and strapped down to Brown's bed.

During its deliberations over the murder verdict, the eight-woman, four-man jury received piles of evidence it requested to review.

The items and papers included notes and a diagram, a bloody pillow, duct tape and underwear that the state said was stuffed into Jesse's mouth during the Sept. 26, 1999, sexual assault that led to his death.

Carpenter faces a May 7 trial on rape and capital murder charges.

Carpenter's father, also named Davis Carpenter, has been present throughout Brown's trial.

"It's a terrible, terrible mess," the senior Carpenter said. "This stuff I'm hearing disgusts me, but it's not all true. Whenever his (Carpenter's) time comes around, the truth will come out."

The state says Carpenter mapped out the assault and watched a portion of it.

In police interviews, Brown characterized the assault on Jesse as "horesplay" and claimed Jesse was a willing participant.

Prosecutor Bob Balfe said logic shows that Jesse did not participate willingly. Balfe produced evidence that showed Carpenter made a late-night run to a Rogers store for duct tape and food items that Brown said he used in the assault.

"Why did they need more duct tape? Was it because he was struggling?" Balfe asked jurors in his closing argument.

Brown has admitted binding and gagging the boy and raping him with a variety of objects. But defense attorney Louis Lim said Brown was guilty of nothing more than statutory rape and manslaughter.

"I think we can all agree that Josh didn't knowingly cause his death," Lim said.

In a brief rebuttal, Balfe said Lim was wrong.

"This isn't a car accident, folks. This is the binding, gagging, and raping of a 13-year-old boy," Balfe said.

From the men's Rogers, Ark., apartment, police seized more than 160 pieces of evidence, including written materials that were blown up to poster sizfor the prosecution's closing argument. A diagram on one used stick figures showing how to bind a child; a letter included the line: "Make him take those drugs."

By BRIAN SKOLOFF
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