3:42 p.m.

The prosecution is done. Ridgway’s final argument was low-key, but poignant.

Defense attorney Alan Fanter has his shot now.

He leans on a podium and addresses the jury.

He reminds them of Couey’s rough upbringing, that he was thrown from a moving car. That his mother didn’t want him.

He talks about how Couey was shuffled from relative to relative.

He didn’t chose his family, Fanter points out.

“He didn’t chose to be a pedophile,” Fanter says. Couey draws on a notepad, morose.

“As his body aged, his mind didn’t. It didn’t keep up,” Fanter tells the jurors.

Fanter’s appeal to jurors is going to be short.

“Vengeance is not justice in our system,” he tells the panel. “No matter what you do, this tragedy cannot be undone. No matter what you do, Mr. Couey will die in prison.

“Whether it is at the hands of an inmate, the hands of God, or the hands of the state.”

He leans on the podium. Couey draws. Jurors all train their eyes on Fanter, who is speaking lowly.

“We as a society do not throw away the life of someone who is clearly mentally ill,” he tells them.

“Life and society wasn’t fair to Mr. Couey.”

He tells them that either way they vote, Couey will die. He just asks that it isn’t at the point of a needle.

“Given the opportunities he never had, allow him to live and die in a normal course.”

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