Jury has verdicts on 3 counts in child murder trial

A Henry County jury announced late Monday night they’d reached unanimous verdicts on three of five counts facing a Stockbridge father in the beating death of his 11-year-old daughter five years ago.

But accused killer Rodney Reaves went back to his cell not knowing if he’d been convicted or acquitted of the most serious charge, malice murder. If convicted, Reaves faces the death penalty.

Without indicating what the verdicts are, the jury foreman told Superior Court Judge Wade Crumbley that the panel decided on the murder, first-degree child cruelty and aggravated battery charges. The remaining charges are two counts of felony murder.

The jury will recess Tuesday because a juror’s husband is having surgery, Crumbley said. The jury will reconvene Wednesday morning.

In his closing argument Monday, prosecutor Jim Wright attacked Reaves, who is charged with killing his daughter, Joella Reaves, over the Thanksgiving holiday in 2003.

“He left her with those injuries,” Wright said during his closing statement. “He didn’t want to have anything more to do with Joella Reaves. He got in his car and got far away from her.”

Reaves maintains his innocence and claims he was 400 miles away when his daughter died from a multitude of injuries from her head to her feet. A defense forensic expert testified last week that Joella died from a single blow to her head and died after Rodney Reaves left for Virginia.

But the DeKalb County medical examiner who conducted the autopsy testified that the girl died slowly over a period of days as her body shut down from being beaten.

“There is no concern about where he was when she died because the reason for Joella’s death began on Nov. 27 and continued to the 28th, 29th, 30th,” Wright told jurors. “She probably died in her sleep, laying in her bed. It doesn’t matter where the defendant was when she passed.”

Joella was found dead in her bed Dec. 1, 2003.

Reaves told police that day that Joella was being punished for stealing loose change from her stepmother’s purse and mouthwash from her half-brother, Mikey Reaves. Stepmother Charlott Reaves, also charged with murder and facing a death penalty trial in April, ordered the girl to write the sentence “I am a thief and a liar, I am good for nothing and I stink.”

Rodney Reaves admitted tying her hands and ankles with speaker wire and keeping her locked in the garage for days. He repeatedly claimed that the girl was punished for refusing to write the sentences.

But Wright showed jurors a piece of notebook paper dotted with Joella’s dried blood with those very words written on it.

“There is a number on here,” Wright said. “It is 794. And she wrote the time, 3:25 a.m., as if she knew something was going on, to tell someone, ‘I was in the garage at 3:25 a.m., bleeding, trying to write these lines.’”

Defense lawyer Gary Bowman blamed the death on Charlott Reaves.

“She had the opportunity, the temper and she didn’t like the girl coming into her house,” Bowman said. “Rodney Reaves was a compliant person.”

Bowman earlier told jurors that Rodney, who’d made a career in the Navy, was dating Charlott and Tanya YeVette Carter in 1991. When Rodney chose to marry Charlott, Carter discovered she was pregnant with Joella, Bowman said. Reaves said he didn’t find out about his daughter until 1996, a year after Carter was killed in a car crash.

He sought custody in 2002, and Joella left Maryland to live in Stockbridge. Reaves told police that his wife constantly complained about his daughter and resented caring for her while he was on a Navy ship in Virginia.

The defendant did not testify during the trial, but he shouted angry words at the prosecutor after closing arguments finished.

“You’re a [expletive deleted] liar,” Reaves yelled at Wright. “As God as my witness.”

The jury had left for lunch when the outburst occurred. Deputies led Reaves out of the courtroom but he could be heard shouting through the closed door. Bowman walked to the holding cell to talk to Reaves. His other attorney, Ricky Morris, said Reaves just needed to calm down.