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Jury Sentences Convicted JCC Shooter Frazier Glenn Cross Jr. To Death

Frazier Glenn Cross Jr. was sentenced to death Tuesday for killing three people at Jewish sites last spring.
Allison Long
/
POOL/The Kansas City Star
Frazier Glenn Cross Jr. was sentenced to death Tuesday for killing three people at Jewish sites last spring.

Frazier Glenn CrossJr. has been sentenced to death for killing three people last spring at the Jewish Community Center and Village Shalom.

The jury agreed that the shooting deaths of William Corporon, Reat Underwood and Terri LaManno qualified as a heinous crime for which  life in prison would be insufficient punishment.

Cross, who represented himself, had to be removed from the courtroom after launching into yet another anti-Semitic tirade.

He'll be sentenced Nov. 10 on five lesser counts, including three of attempted murder, aggravated assault and discharging a firearm at a building. 

District Attorney Steve Howe opened Tuesday by reminding the jury Cross not only murdered three people on April 13, 2014, he put countless others’ lives at risk during his shooting spree.

“Recall that he sat there on the stand and chuckled and gleefully recalled what he did that day,” Howe said.

Cross, who is representing himself, then delivered a last, lengthy tirade during which he oscillated between insulting Jews and insulting the jury.

“I thrive on hate,” Cross said. “I love to hate. Hate gets me through my days, gives me a warm, soothing feeling in my stomach to know that I hate my enemies.”

At one point, Cross called Judge Thomas Kelly Ryan an “egg-sucking mule” for sustaining Howe’s objections.

Cross told the jury he didn’t care if they sentenced him to death because he wanted to die a martyr for the white nationalist movement.

“What the defendant doesn’t want to accept, is that the majority of people in this country don’t agree with his personal beliefs,” Howe told the jury when Cross finished. “In the last hour, folks, did you hear anything that reduces the moral culpability of the defendant’s actions?”

Howe urged the jury not to buy into Cross’ “reverse psychology”and sentence him to life in prison.

Cross gave the district attorney the middle finger.

The jury deliberated for 90 minutes.

Copyright 2015 KCUR 89.3

Elle covers education for KCUR. The best part of her job is talking to students. Before coming to KCUR in 2014, Elle covered Indiana education policy for NPR’s StateImpact project. Her work covering Indiana’s exit from the Common Core was nationally recognized with an Edward R. Murrow award. Her work at KCUR has been recognized by the Missouri Broadcasters Association and the Kansas City Press Club. She is a graduate of the University Of Missouri School Of Journalism. Elle regularly tweets photos of her dog, Kingsley. There is a wounded Dr. Ian Malcolm bobblehead on her desk.