Alfredie Steele, Jr. returned to court this morning, still smarting from last night’s guilty verdict.

Lead attorney Tom Hanlon told Senior Judge Robert Beach that Steele had something to say.

Steele stood up.

“Yesterday, a lot of facts that came out on my behalf were not stated or stressed to the jury,” he said. “Things that I specifically asked to be stated and stressed to the jury were not stated..”

Asked what he meant, Steele said, “The fact that I cannot be put at the scene of the crime, the fact that I don’t even know what went on.”

Steele said he also took issue with the admission into evidence of a photograph depicting him holding SKS rifle. “A picture taken from a raid two months before any of this happened,” Steele said.

“Is there anything else you want to tell me,” Beach asked.

“That’s it,” Steele said.

“Do you wish to have counsel continue to represent you as counsel in this procceding and, if not, why?” Beach asked.

“At this point, there’s really no point in me dismissing them now,” he said. “I might as well let them go on and finish what they’re doing.”

The jury of 10 women and two men will now hear evidence and make a sentence recommendation to Beach. Their only choices are death or life in prison without the possibility of parole. A judge has the final say in a sentence but must give “great weight” to a jury recommendation.

The jurors entered the courtroom at 10:07, and the attorneys began opening statements.

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