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Two days after they convicted David Brown on a first-degree murder charge in the Lafourche Parish courthouse, a jury voted to sentence the child-killer to death.
After a short deliberation last Tuesday the jury opted for the death sentence.
In Louisiana death is performed by lethal injection.
On Nov. 4, 2012, Brown murdered Jacquelin Nieves and her daughters, 7-year-old Gabriela and 1-year-old Izabela. The children died from stab wounds and Gabriela, according to testimony at the trial, died from smoke inhalation. Brown had set fire to their apartment in Lockport.
Prosecutors and defense lawyers were unable to discuss the case when it was on-going due to a gag order.
District Attorney Cam Morvant led the prosecution of the 38-year-old Brown, who was defended by New Orleans attorney Anthony Cuccia.
Cuccia continually challenged aspects of the prosecution’s case, which he has maintained is based on circumstantial evidence, throughout the trial.
The trend in many Louisiana jurisdictions has of late been away from pushing capital prosecutions. Officials cite the money needed for appeals, security and other expenses, which gets invested on a meager return. Defendants can wait a decade or more for actual execution if a jury finds it is warranted. In large part that’s because of the high degree of scrutiny defense attorneys say a verdict of death requires. The penalty of death, they note, is irreversible, and so extra care must be taken.
Among the issues brought up on appeal prior to trial was whether the 1996 stabbing by Brown of his sister-in-law in Chauvin, and an intrusion into an apartment adjoining that of the murder victims earlier on the night of the crime, could be introduced at trial. Judge Barbera had ruled that those prior acts could be considered by the jury.
Detectives learned Carlos Nieves Jr., Jacquelin’s husband and father to Gabriela and Izabela, had been asleep downstairs in the apartment during the entire incident. Brown was charged with the attempted murder of Carlos Nieves Jr. due to the fact that Carlos was asleep when the fire was set. He eventually awoke and called 911. Officers and firefighters responded to the scene where they discovered the bodies of the three victims in the upstairs bedroom.
Through the course of the investigation, detectives discovered a knife thought to be the weapon used on the victims. Detectives also collected DNA evidence at the crime scene which was determined to be a positive match for David Brown’s DNA.
Brown has an extensive and violent criminal history dating back to 1994. Prior to Brown’s arrest on November 4, 2012, he had been arrested 28 times. In April 1996, Brown was arrested for attempted second degree murder, but later agreed to plead guilty to an aggravated battery charge in that case. Brown has also been charged 18 other times with various battery charges, and he has been charged with assault three times. Other charges for which he was arrested include terrorizing, criminal trespassing, drug possession, issuing worthless checks, burglary, theft, and unauthorized entry into an inhabited dwelling. According to records, Brown was also convicted of DWI, aggravated assault with serious bodily injury, and simple burglary in Texas in 2003. Most recently, Brown had been serving time for the Louisiana Department of Corrections for a theft charge, but he was released from custody and placed on probation on October 26, 2012, just nine days before the murders occurred. Two of Brown’s siblings were also incarcerated at the time of his arrest, one of whom is serving a life sentence for murder.
Last week’s decision by the jury marks the first time in 40 years that Lafourche Parish has sent a convict to death row. •
No. 7 Triple killer sentenced to die by jury
A Lafourche Parish jury sentenced a Houma killer to death Nov. 1 for taking the live of a woman her two little girls in 2012.
David Brown, 38, was convicted of murdering 29-year-old Jacquelin Nieves, her 7-year-old daughter and her daughters, 7-year-old Gabriela and 1-year-old Izabela.
Brown sexually assaulted the mother and the 7-year-old; all three were stabbed to death and Brown then set the family’s Lockport apartment afire.
“Justice was done,” said District Attorney Cam Morvant, who prosecuted the case.
New Orleans attorney Kerry Cuccia, who mounted a vigorous defense during the fact-finding portion of Brown’s trial, expressed disappointment with the outcome. During the penalty phase of the trial, Brown opted to represent himself.
Long-standing law has required that juries must first decide whether first-degree murder has been committed before separately deciding the question of whether a defendant should live or die.
The Brown case marke the first time in four decades that a death penalty has been imposed in Lafourche Parish.
