Local

Jury recommends death for man found guilty in Titusville slaying

TITUSVILLE, Fla. — A Brevard County jury has recommended the death sentence for a man found guilty of first-degree murder in the 2003 killing of 19-year-old Carlos Perez in Melbourne.

The jury recommended the sentence for Henry Lee Jones shortly before 3 p.m. Wednesday. On Tuesday, that same jury found Jones guilty of murder.

Prosecutors asked for the death penalty for Jones, 50, who represented himself in the trial and in the penalty phase of his case.

Jones told the judge on Tuesday he wanted an attorney for the penalty phase of the case, but Jones refused to accept an attorney.

Perez's body was found bound in a Melbourne motel room in August 2003, his throat slashed.

"Just by looking at it, you think that knife there caused (that) kind of wounds on that victim?" Jones asked the medical examiner.

"Most likely, I think that kind of weapon was used," Dr. Sajid Qaiser said.

The same type of knife was found in Jones' Lincoln Town Car, along with a Puerto Rican flag identified as likely belonging to the victim by prosecutors.

"Did you plant a Puerto Rican flag in the trunk of the Lincoln Town Car?" asked Russ Bausch, assistant state attorney.

"No, sir," witness Scott Dwyer said.

Jones tried to call into question the chain of custody of evidence in the case. Other times, he simply complained that he didn't have access to all of the discovery in the case, an assertion prosecutors called a "falsehood."

"From here on out, if he has any discovery issues, we need to handle those at the bench," Bausch said.

At one point, Jones even apologized to a witness for some earlier confusion he had in the case.

"I want to apologize to him for what I had said last week to him about a report," Jones said. "It wasn't your report. I found out who it was. My bad."

Jones is already on Tennessee's death row after being convicted of murder in another case.