Mississippi jury recomends death sentence for killer of 8

MAGNOLIA, Miss. — A Mississippi man was given four death sentences by a jury, hours after he blamed the devil for his actions the night eight people were shot to death.

Willie Cory Godbolt, 37, was convicted Tuesday of the May 2017 slayings of eight people. Four of the convictions were for murder, which carry a sentence of life in prison. Four other convictions were for capital murder — a killing committed along with another felony.

Capital murder is punishable by the death penalty, but jurors must agree unanimously to set that as the punishment. Without unanimous agreement, the judge would set sentences of life in prison.

The unanimous decisions for the death penalty were handed down Thursday after the same jurors who convicted Godbolt heard testimony during the penalty phase of the trial.

Godbolt gave a rambling speech full of religious references, and at one point a spectator seated among the victims’ families yelled at him to shut up, the (McComb) Enterprise-Journal reported.

Godbolt said he had prayed to be a better man, “but the devil came to kill and destroy. He wasn’t going to let that be.”

Investigators said that on May 27, 2017, Godbolt went to his in-laws’ home and argued with his estranged wife about their children. A deputy sheriff, Godbolt’s mother-in-law and two other people were killed there. In the early hours of the next day, two young people were killed in a second house, and a married couple was killed in a third house.

“My life came to a screeching halt,” Godbolt said earlier Thursday, describing that night. “I couldn’t fight the battle that was raging inside me.”