A Navarro County jury Thursday convicted a Corsicana man of capital murder in the deaths of his three daughters in a house fire Dec. 23, 1991.The eight-woman, four-man jury deliberated for one hour and 10 minutes before finding Cameron Todd Willingham, 24, guilty in the deaths of 1-year-old twins Kamron and Kameron and 2-year-old Amber. Willingham dropped his eyes when the verdict was read but showed no other signs of emotion.

The jury listened to more than five hours of testimony in the punishment phase of the trial Thursday afternoon, before both the state and the defense rested their cases.

Willingham, as in the first portion of the trial, refused to testify in his defense during the punishment phase, stating outside the presence of the jury that he felt “not that I don’t wish to (testify), that I don’t feel I need to.”

Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty for Cunningham (sic), who has a string ofcriminal convictions and arrestsover the past decade. The jury also couled (sic) sentence him to life in prison.

During closing arguments in the guilt-innocence phase of the trial Thursday morning, defense attorney David Martin said the prosecution’s case was built on “the most unreasonable of theories” and questioned the credibility of two of the prosecution’s witnesses – fire investigator Manuel Vasquez and Navarro County jail inmate Johnny Webb.

Vasquez had testified he was sure the fire was intentionally started. When asked if he had ever been mistaken in the 2,000 fire he investigated, Vasquez replied to the best of his knowledge he never had been.

“He is right,” Martin said sarcastically of the investigator’s claim. “He is never, ever wrong.”

Of Webb, who testified Willingham had confessed to him in a conversation the two men had in the Navarro County Justice Center, where Willingham is being held on $1 million bond, Martin said the inmate’s testimony should be considered doubtful because he suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder.

“Why would Mr. Webb tell us a lie? He’s a mental patient,” Martin told the jury. “He can’t even remember robbing a lady … but the prosecution wants you to believe it (his testimony) anyway.”

When he was on the witness stand Webb said he could not recall the incident for which he was convicted of aggravated robbery.

First Assistant District Attorney John Jackson defended Vasquez, saying, “He can read fires like a book an every mark of that fire is a page in that book.”

Jackson acknowledged Webb is a “thief and a doper” but said he had nothing to gain by testifying truthfully.

The prosecuting attorney attacked the defense’s theory that one of the children accidentally started the blaze as unreasonable.

“The most offensive part of this case,” Jackson said, “is that the defendant is still trying to put the blame on the children.”

Just before sending the jury to deliberation, Jackson implored them to find a verdict of guilty, calling Willingham a :monster.”

“We tell our children that monsters don’t exist, that they are only shadows on a wall,” the prosecutor said. “Well, ladies and gentlemen, monsters do exist and one sits in this courtroom and its name is Cameron Todd Willingham.”

As the prosecution began the punishment phase of the trial, Jackson called to the stand Stacey Willingham, the defendant’s wife who testified her children were not afraid of their father, denied her husband beat her or tried to kill the twins while she was pregnant with them by kicking her in the stomach.

Mrs. Willingham said she was not an abused or battered wife, and told Jackson while she and her husband often fought, Willingham often has more bruises than she did after the fights.

“Me and Todd argued just like anybody else,” she said. “A lot of times, Todd got more bruises and stuff than I did.”

Jackson asked the mother of the three dead children if she had hurt the children, to which she vehemently said, “No.”

On cross examination, Martin asked the young woman is she was asking the jury to spare her husband’s life, and she said she was.

When re-questioned by Jackson, Mrs. Willingham said she did not believe her husband killed her children.

“How can you stand by a man who burned up your three children?” Jackson asked her.

“I don’t believe he did that,” she responded.

Mrs. Willingham also denied she made comments to her friend, Kimberly King of Gainesville, that her husband had beat her while she was pregnant with the twins.

Miss King later testified that Mrs. Willingham has made comments to that effect and the mother had told her that during a period when the couple was in the process of separating, Willingham told his wife that he “could take the VCR and she could take Amber, and it was an even trade.” Mrs. Willingham also denied her husband ever said that.

The prosecution also called to testify James Grigson, a noted psychiatrist known as “Dr. Death” because of the numerous times he has testified in trials in which the defendant could be sentenced to death.

Grigson testified that a person who had experienced the incidents prosecution witnesses testified Willingham had experienced – including killing a dog by beating in the head with a stick and running it over with an automobile – was a sociopath.

Grigson defined a sociopath as one who does not have a conscious, who manipulates people, who has a disregard for other’s people property and – in its most severe form – has a disregard for other human beings.

Should a sociopath become involved in extremely violent activities before the age of 30, there is virtually no type of medical treatment and no type of medicine that can treat that person, Grigson testified under questioning by Jackson. He also said that such a person would “absolutely” be a continuing threat in the future, a question the jurors must answer when deciding whether to sentence Willingham to death.

Defense attorneys called about 20 witnesses – most of them relatives of Willingham’s – most of whom stated they did not believe Willingham was a violent person and asking he be sentenced to life in prison.

Many of the defense witnesses – including Willingham’s natural parents and his step-mother who raised him – said they did not believe Willingham had committed the crime.

Also testifying in Willingham’s behalf was Patricia Gooden, an attorney who had been Willingham’s social worker when he was a juvenile who was charged with numerous crimes, including drug abuse. Witnesses testified the defendant had a serious addiction to paint sniffing in the past.

Ms. Gooden said she had not worked with Willingham since he was a juvenile, but said she did not believe he would be capable of killing anyone. She also said many of his problems stemmed from his addiction to inhalants and that the treatment programs he had been enrolled in did not provide the help he needed.