Sentencing phase in Timothy Jones Jr. murder trial begins

Jones faces either the death penalty or life in prison without parole

LEXINGTON, S.C. (WOLO) — Just days after Timothy Jones Jr. was found guilty for the murders of his five children, the sentencing phase in his murder trial began Thursday morning.

Some witnesses who took the stand during the first phase of the trial came back to testify in the sentencing phase. Some described the impact the Jones children had on their lives.

When looking back at when the three oldest Jones children were students at Saxe Gotha Elementary School, Janet Ricard, who was the school’s Assistant Principal at the time, says she remembers how their presence would brighten each school day.

“They were very sweet children. Very loving children. Made friends very easily. Merah had her special friends. Nahtahn, he was an active little thing. Eli loved making friends and really was a friend to everybody,” Ricard said.

Some say their bright smiles brightened lives beyond the classroom.

“To know these kids, they were able to have an impact, no matter if you were having a bad day, they were very sweet,” said Joy Lorick, a former babysitter for the Jones children.

Prosecutors put the impact the Jones children had on others at the forefront of their plan to convince the jury their father should receive the death penalty.

“It’s not about vengeance, it’s about the punishment that truly fits this crime,” said Deputy Solicitor Suzanne Mayes in her opening statement.

The prosecution also showed videos of the two oldest children crying to see their mother.

Prosecutors also played an audio recording of a phone call while Jones was in custody in November 2014. In that call, Jones told family members he pointed to his wife as the reason for the events that followed.

“The catalyst was the fact I was seeing myself in those kids. Nahtahn was trying to get to his mom. It’s not him. It’s her. It was her. She caused the whole thing,” Jones recalled to family members over the phone.

However, the defense points to mental illness as the reason Jones should not receive the death penalty.

“You don’t have to kill Tim Jones. You don’t kill people who are sick,” said Boyd Young, Jones’s lead defense attorney, in his opening statement.

Of the five people who took the stand Thursday, four had previously testified during the first phase of the trial.

The only new witness called by the prosecution was retired Lt. Dave Lawrence, formerly of the State Law Enforcement Division (SLED). Lawrence traveled with FBI Special Agent David Mackey and Sgt. Adam Creach to assist with the discovery of the five bodies.

On September 9, 2014, three days after he was arrested in Mississippi, Jones led the investigators, including Lt. Lawrence, to a wooded area in rural Alabama, where they found the five bodies in black garbage bags.

During Lawrence’s testimony, which featured graphic photographs of what was inside the five plastic bags, a juror became visibly upset, which led to Judge Eugene Griffith calling for a break.

From that point on, the prosecution would still be able to enter photographs from the autopsy into evidence, but they would not be displayed to the jury inside the courtroom. Judge Griffith ruled jurors could access the images during deliberations.

Shelby Derrick, a former crime scene investigator with the Lexington County Sheriff’s Department, testified about extracting data off the cell phone of Jones’s ex-wife. She previously testified on May 20, when she talked about picking up Jones’s cell phone from investigators in Atlanta.

Janice Edwards Ross, a forensic pathologist who performed the autopsies on the children in September 2014, returned to the stand to identify photographs of the children prior to the autopsies and to confirm their cause and manner of death. She first testified on May 20.

Ricard was the second overall witness called to the stand on the first day of testimony (May 15). On Thursday, she testified in greater detail about her relationship with the three oldest children.

Lyric testified on May 29 about her time with Jones and the children while on family vacations to Myrtle Beach and Disney World in the summer leading up to the murders. She testified she also called the Department of Social Services (DSS) to investigate Jones and his treatment of the children.

Court adjourned early Thursday afternoon due to a scheduling conflict for one of the jurors. The prosecution is set to call more witnesses to the stand Friday morning.