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Serial Shooter Dale Hausner testifies in his own murder trial earlier this year, just weeks before a jury convicted him of six murders and 74 other crimes in a year-long killing spree. File photo

Jurors took just two hours today to decide serial killer Dale Hausner is eligible for the death penalty under Arizona law. The lightening-fast decision means the 36-year-old former Mesa resident will now head to the final phase of his marathon murder trial in which the same jury will determine whether, in fact, he deserves to be put to death.

In all, jurors found him eligible for the death penalty in each of the six murders they convicted him of on March 13. The decisions came in the murders of victims David Estrada, Nathaniel Schoffner, Jose Ortis, Marco Carillo, Claudia Gutierrez-Cruz and Robin Blasnek. All were gunned down by Hausner in separate nighttime shootings in 2005 and 2006, stretching across the Phoenix valley.

The manner and sheer number of killings committed by Dale Hausner make him eligible for the death penalty, his jury decided this afternoon. Hausner, nicknamed the Serial Shooter, will now move on to the next phase of his trial in which the same jury will decide whether he lives or dies.

More info to come.

Dale Hausner

Dale Hausner was no ordinary killer, prosecutor Vince Imbordino told a jury today in a downtown Phoenix courtroom. The 36-year-old former airport janitor relished his attacks. He kept tallies of them. He collected souvenirs.

“Clearly, the evidence in this case supports the conclusion that this defendant and the crimes he committed make him different, set him apart from other killers and make him eligible for the death penalty,” Imbordino said during the first day of the sentencing phase in Hausner’s marathon murder trial.

A jury convicted Hausner of six murders and 74 other crimes earlier this month, sending him into the next stage of the trial. The same 12 people who handed down the verdict are now being asked to decide whether he is eligible for the death penalty. If they decide he is, they will then have to chance to choose whether he deserves it.

Imbordino told the jury Hausner, nicknamed the Serial Shooter, fits all the requirements to be a candidate for death. “This defendant went about in a calculated manner to kill people,” the prosecutor said. “He looked for his targets. He selected his targets at random. And those poor people were killed. He had no reason to do that.”

Paul Patrick

The man considered the “face of the victims” during the Serial Shooter trial appears to be chasing off death once again, surviving a second near-fatal experience that was a likely result of his 2006 attack.

Paul Patrick nearly died three years ago after serial killers Dale Hausner and Samuel Dieteman pulled up beside him in a car and put a shotgun blast into his abdomen as he walked down a Phoenix street. Patrick spent several weeks under intensive care at a local hospital before defying the expectations of doctors and police, and making an incredible recovery.

Today, Patrick is doing it again. The 48-year-old collapsed more than three weeks ago from a stroke, which doctors believed was a complication of the shotgun pellets that remain lodged inside his torso. He had spent most of the time since then once more under intensive care. At times, he was surviving only minute-by-minute. During the past several days, however, Patrick was moved out of intensive care and into a local rehabilitation ward.

I visited Patrick today in his new location, and the improvement was noticeable immediately. His face and arms were no longer swollen, and the tubes that were previously keeping him alive were nowhere to be seen. He can speak and appeared fully coherent, even funny at times. It was a far cry from the condition he was in at the beginning of this month.

Dale Hausner

Convicted serial killer Dale Hausner wants to block a jury from hearing any evidence that could convince them to spare his life during the next phase of his murder trial, he told a judge on Thursday.

In a secret hearing at a downtown Phoenix courtroom, Hausner told Judge Roland Steinle he wanted to skip the portion of the trial in which various witnesses would testify on his behalf. Instead, he agreed to simply give a speech to the jury before they decide whether to sentence him to death.

Nicknamed the “Serial Shooter,” the 36-year-old former janitor was convicted on March 13 of murdering six people and wounding numerous others in a shooting spree that lasted more than a year. Throughout six months of trial in Maricopa County Superior Court, he denied having any involvement with the killings.

The Thursday hearing was closed to the public and attorneys were barred from talking about what took place. However, because of an apparent fluke, minutes of the secret session (download PDF) were posted Friday on the website of the court clerk’s office. Hausner’s attorney’s declined to comment about the posting.