sobbing parents beg judge to deny bond

The man in the orange jumpsuit was escorted through the holding-room door, his hands and feet shackled. The half-filled courtroom fell silent.
Brent Gay, 32, never looked at his only relative in the room, his grandmother, or at the two rows filled with the family of Flint McManus, the man he’s accused of murdering last Dec. 5.
Killings make big news when they happen and when verdicts come down, often many years later in the backlogged Sixth Judicial Circuit. But this part of the process – a routine bond hearing Tuesday – usually gets little notice.
Circuit Judge Brian Gibbons had to decide if Gay would go free pending trial. But first, he would hear from McManus’ parents.
“I am begging you. Please do not let him out on bond,” said Tina Deese, sobbing and leaning on her sister for support. “For him to stand there and ask to get out this time of the year, to go do holidays with his family – and I will do my holiday with my son at his grave site – it breaks my heart.”
She clutched a memorial video of her son in one hand, a tissue in the other.
“He took from me my firstborn son and my best friend,” she said.
Heyward McManus, the victim’s father, paused to gather himself as he addressed the judge.
“What he did to us is unconscionable,” he said. “I can’t believe he can stand here asking to go home 10 months after killing our son, who is laying in a graveyard.”
Neither parent spoke Gay’s name.
The defendant, standing at a podium about 15 feet in front of the parents, never turned around to look at them. He faced the judge throughout the 20-minute hearing.
Gay’s grandmother, Alice Wallace, sat quietly an arm’s length from the grieving family. She spoke out only once, when McManus said he had heard her say that her grandson was on drugs and she was afraid of him.
“I did not! I did not!” she yelled out. A bailiff moved in her direction, and she remained quiet after that.
Gay is accused of shooting McManus, 40, in the head while they and two other men watched a football game at Gay’s home on Branch Street in Lancaster.
Tuesday was the second bond hearing for Gay. Bond was denied in March.
Deputy Solicitor Lisa Collins asked Gibbons to deny bond for Gay due to the violent nature of the crime and the fact that he has only one tie to the community and therefore is a flight risk.
Just before the bond hearing, Collins arraigned Gay on an additional charge of possession of a firearm during a violent crime.
Gay’s attorney, John Delgado of Columbia, asked the judge to consider the circumstances of Gay’s life. He said Gay’s parents were killed in a car wreck when he was 3 years old, leaving his grandmother to raise him.
Delgado said Gay barely survived a car wreck three years ago and “was prescribed medication that led us to this point today. That medication was either overprescribed, over used or abused by him.”
Gibbons announced his decision just before lunchtime Wednesday, after deliberating overnight. Gay will be held without bond, and will await his trial behind bars.
It is often years before murder cases come to trial in the Sixth Circuit. Two young defendants out on bond awaiting murder trials have themselves been murdered this month in Lancaster.
Lancaster County has had eight murders so far this year. There were five in 2015, all of them in the last four months of the year.

10/28/16

Follow Reporter Mandy Catoe on Twitter @MandyCatoeTLN or contact her at (803) 283-1152