{"id":10012,"date":"2011-12-15T15:50:59","date_gmt":"2011-12-15T23:50:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lewiscountysirens.com\/?p=10012"},"modified":"2011-12-15T20:14:54","modified_gmt":"2011-12-16T04:14:54","slug":"breaking-news-triple-murder-booth-found-guilty-on-all-counts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/?p=10012","title":{"rendered":"Breaking news: Triple-murder: Booth found guilty on all counts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Updated at 6:56 p.m. and 7:24 p.m.<\/em><\/p>\n

By Sharyn\u00a0 L. Decker
\nLewis County Sirens news reporter<\/strong><\/p>\n

CHEHALIS – Jurors took only two hours – over lunch – to decide John Allen Booth Jr. was guilty on all counts in his triple-murder trial in Lewis County Superior Court today.<\/p>\n

Booth, 32, faces a sentence of life without the possibility of release under the state’s so-called three strikes law.<\/p>\n

\"2011.1206.booth.close_2\"<\/a>

John Allen Booth Jr.<\/p><\/div>\n

The former Onalaskan was convicted of first-degree murders for the deaths of 16-year-old David “D.J.” West Jr. and 50-year-old Tony Williams of Randle. He was convicted of second-degree murder for David West Sr., 52, and the attempted murder of Denise R. Salts, 52.<\/p>\n

All were shot in the head.<\/p>\n

The shootings took place Aug. 21, 2010 inside the Salkum-area home where the Wests and Salts had lived less than a year.<\/p>\n

Lewis County prosecutors described the shootings as attempts to eliminate witnesses after West Sr. brought out a shotgun which prompted Booth to shoot him with a 9 mm pistol. The visit by Booth and his former prison cell mate Ryan McCarthy was related to “taxing” West Sr. on behalf of drug dealer Robbie Russell, according to prosecutors.<\/p>\n

The eight-man, four-woman jury also found Booth guilty of attempted extortion and first-degree unlawful possession of a firearm.<\/p>\n

Booth stood quietly beside his lawyer facing the judge, hands in trouser pockets, as the court clerk read the verdict, his eye lids dropping for a slightly long blink when he heard the word guilty.<\/p>\n

The jury found he committed the offenses with a firearm, which adds time to a sentence, as well as determining Booth displayed or demonstrated an egregious lack of remorse in the slayings of David Jr. and Williams.<\/p>\n

Chief Criminal Deputy Prosecutor Brad Meagher and Deputy Prosecutor Will Halstead described those killings as executions.<\/p>\n

The 6-foot-3 Booth leaned back, elbow on the defense table and turned his chair toward jurors as they were polled one by one on the verdict.<\/p>\n

When it was over, he made the comment, “Vote for Barack Obama.” Nobody replied.<\/p>\n

Afterward, outside the courtroom, Meagher said: “This victory goes to law enforcement.”<\/p>\n

“They caught this guy after on a manhunt after a week,” Meagher said praising the detective work.<\/p>\n

While jurors asked to confer with the attorneys when it was over, defense lawyer Roger Hunko left without speaking to them.<\/p>\n

“I really don’t have anything to say,” Hunko said as he packed his files into his car’s trunk outside the courthouse. “It is what it is.”<\/p>\n

His client already has two “strikes” so another serious felony means his sentence will be life without parole, Hunko said.<\/p>\n

When Booth took the witness stand yesterday, he denied being at the house except for earlier in the evening when he visited to collect money for a pound of methamphetamine he said he had “fronted” West Sr.<\/p>\n

He will be sentenced at 10 o’clock tomorrow morning.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Updated at 6:56 p.m. and 7:24 p.m. By Sharyn\u00a0 L. Decker Lewis County Sirens news reporter CHEHALIS – Jurors took only two hours – over lunch – to decide John Allen Booth Jr. was guilty on all counts in his triple-murder trial in Lewis County Superior Court today. Booth, 32, faces a sentence of life […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9,10],"class_list":["post-10012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-top-story","tag-by-sharyn-l-decker","tag-news-reporter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10012"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10012\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10015,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10012\/revisions\/10015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lewiscountysirens.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}