Murder defendant stunned into submission

Terrell Cochise Young, who was unceremoniously booted from his murder trial after he spit on his own lawyers, will get another chance to be present when a jury decides his future -- and, perhaps, whether he lives or dies.

District Judge Joseph Pavlikowski said Thursday that when the case returns to court next week he will offer the 20-year-old defendant an opportunity to remain at his trial on charges he participated in the execution slaying of four young men. The judge said that if Young agrees to behave, he will be permitted to stay in the courtroom.

After two violent outbursts in court Wednesday -- the last resulting in his being disabled with a zap from a security stun belt -- Young was removed and jury selection continued without him.

A jury was picked late Thursday, but opening statements and testimony won't begin until Tuesday afternoon.

Prosecutors said that Young told them before jury selection began that he was going to do whatever it took to postpone his trial.

Pavlikowski already rejected several complaints from Young that he can't get along with his attorneys and that they haven't done what is necessary to prepare his defense.

The outbursts in front of a shocked jury panel also didn't have the desired effect.

Defense attorney Lew Wolfbrandt had asked that a mistrial be declared after Young was hauled out of court in handcuffs, but the judge refused.

Pavlikowski said that under Nevada law, a defendant cannot create a mistrial through courtroom antics.

In the first outburst Wednesday morning, as prospective jurors were questioned about their willingness to impose the death penalty if there is a conviction, Young suddenly stood up, scattered documents from atop the defense table and then overturned the prosecution's table. Four bailiffs and corrections officers subdued him, and he returned to court for the afternoon session wearing a stun belt that, in essence, is a remote controlled stun gun.

After he spit on one lawyer, he was given a brief zap. After he spit on his other attorney, Young was disabled in an electrically induced convulsion.

Young is the second of three defendants charged in the quadruple murder to stand trial. The first, 19-year-old Sikia Smith, was convicted of first-degree murder earlier this summer and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

On Aug. 14, 1998, Jeffrey Biddle, 19, Tracey Gorringe, 20, Matthew Mowen, 19, and Peter Talamantez, 17, were shot in the head as they lay gagged and duct-taped during an organized and systematic robbery in a home near Nellis Boulevard and Tropicana Avenue.

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