A jury deliberated for about seven hours Friday before convicting a man of killing two DeKalb County police officers.
William Maurice Woodard, 31, could face the death penalty after guilty verdicts in the deaths of Officers Ricky Bryant Jr. and Eric Barker on Jan. 16, 2008. The sentencing phase is expected to get under way next week and could take several days.
Bryant, 26, and Barker, 33, were working off-duty security jobs at an apartment complex near Decatur when they were shot. Each officer was survived by a wife and four children.
Woodard, who has a history of drug arrests and convictions, testified earlier this week that Bryant and Barker were “jumping and beating me” before firing shots that missed him. But several other witnesses testified that Woodard was the aggressor.
Woodard was a passenger in a car that the officers tried to stop after smelling marijuana, according to testimony. The driver, Herbie Durham, gave officers his driver’s license but Woodard declined to, leading Bryant to pull him from the car and begin to search him.
Barker ran toward the passenger side of the car as Woodard and Bryant began to struggle and almost immediately, Durham testified, shots were fired. Durham was initially charged with murder, but the charges were later dropped.
Woodard is expected to undergo a psychiatric evaluation before he is sentenced.
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