Nov. 14--Separate Cook County juries took little time Thursday to convict two men charged with murder in the 2010 shooting of off-duty Chicago police Officer Thomas Wortham IV outside his parents' South Side home.
The juries deliberated about three hours each before finding that Paris McGee, 24, and Toyious Taylor, 34, knew that Wortham was a police officer, ensuring both men face mandatory life sentences.
The prosecution's star witness, Thomas Wortham III, Wortham's father and a retired Chicago police sergeant, testified that McGee had fired a shot at him from the passenger seat of a getaway car during a wild shootout with two other suspects. Prosecutors said Taylor drove the getaway car, hitting the younger Wortham after he had been shot and dragging him about a quarter mile down the street.
The elder Wortham and his wife, Carolyn, embraced supporters after Taylor's conviction was announced about 8 p.m. A separate jury at the Leighton Criminal Court Building had convicted McGee a couple of hours earlier.
"We just wanted to see justice for our son," the elder Wortham said. "He loved everybody. He did his best, and I want people to remember that. I'd like to see more young people grow up to be people who want to give back. He always gave back. And he would help anyone at anytime. That's who he was."
In closing arguments earlier Thursday, attorneys for McGee and Taylor questioned how the elder Wortham could identify their clients as the men in the getaway car in the midst of a chaotic shootout that took place at night and lasted only seconds.
Wortham, 30, was fatally shot outside his family's Chatham home when robbers attempted to take his new Yamaha motorcycle. He had returned home a month earlier from a second tour of duty in Iraq.
Wortham, one of six police officers killed in the line of duty in 2010, had spoken out against violence in the Chatham neighborhood to a Tribune reporter less than a week before he was slain.
"When people think of the South Side of Chicago, they think violence. In Chatham, that's not what we see," Wortham said after two shootings at a basketball court in Cole Park near his parents' home. "We're going to fix it, so it doesn't happen again."
Prosecutors allege that Taylor and McGee waited in the getaway car while two others, cousins Brian and Marcus Floyd, confronted Wortham. Brian Floyd was killed in a gunbattle with Wortham and his father, while Marcus Floyd was badly injured in the shootout. He is awaiting trial.
Taylor and McGee were also convicted of murder in connection with Brian Floyd's death. The juries, however, acquitted each of the attempted murder of the elder Wortham.
In dramatic testimony last week, the elder Wortham, 67, said he shot both Floyds while armed with his own gun as well as his son's weapon, which had fallen onto the street after his son was mortally wounded. Both parents, watching from the front of the house, said they heard their son announce himself as a police officer before shots rang out.
"He died trying to protect himself, he died trying to protect his family, he died trying to protect his property," Assistant State's Attorney Mary Jo Murtaugh told jurors. "He died being a police officer."
McGee's attorney, Debra Niesen, urged jurors not to let sympathy for the Wortham family sway them while noting that no physical evidence tied her client to the shooting.
She also said the elder Wortham's identification of McGee was suspect since he was shown a photo array in which her client, who then had braids, was one of only two pictured with braids.
Niesen also questioned how well Wortham could have identified McGee amid the chaos.
"It doesn't make sense that he's watching a departing car when there's two guys with guns (in front of his house)," said Niesen, calling Wortham's identification of her client "confused and mistaken."
Taylor's attorney, Sandra Parris echoed Niesen's arguments about the lack of physical evidence and also questioned the elder Wortham's identification of her client. Testimony showed that the driver's side of the getaway car faced away from the Wortham family home and that the driver never got out, she said. That would make it impossible for the elder Wortham to see Taylor in that split second with only a single street light illuminating the dark, she said.
She also reminded jurors not to let Wortham's profession affect their judgment.
Parris also said Wortham's parents would not have been able to hear their son yell out "Chicago police" because he was astride a running motorcycle in the street while they were back by the house.
Judge Timothy Joyce must decide if the third defendant, Marcus Floyd, is mentally fit to go to trial. Floyd's lawyers have said he has amnesia and can't recall the events of that night because of injuries he suffered in the shooting.
sschmadeke@tribpub.com
Twitter @SteveSchmadeke
