Was this dad’s sexual deviance so out of control he murdered his own toddler son? Or, was it a horrible accident with deadly consequences?
Obsessed with seeking sex outside his marriage, prosecutors say, a Georgia man left his 22-month-old son to die inside a hot SUV so he could “escape from one life into another.”
Now it’s up to a jury to decide if that’s true.
Prosecutors opened their case Monday against Justin Ross Harris, who is charged with malice murder and other crimes in the June 2014 death of his toddler, Cooper. Assistant District Attorney Chuck Boring called Harris a deceptive man who saw his wife and child as obstacles to fulfilling his sexual desires.
“This case is about death, deception and a double life,” Boring told a jury evenly split between men and women during his opening statement Monday.
Harris’ defense attorneys will get their first chance to speak to the jury Tuesday morning. The defense team’s opening statement got pushed back after court was delayed for 90 minutes late Monday afternoon. Superior Court Judge Mary Staley Clark recessed for the evening without giving an explanation.
Authorities say Cooper died after sweltering for seven hours in the parking lot of the Home Depot office where his father worked as a computer technician in the Atlanta suburb of Cobb County. Citing pretrial publicity, the judge moved the case 275 miles to Brunswick, on the Georgia coast.
Harris’ attorneys have previously called the boy’s death a tragic accident. Harris told police he watched cartoons with his son that morning, took him to breakfast at a Chick-fil-A restaurant and kissed Cooper while strapping him into his car seat. But Harris said he forgot to drop his son off at day care and drove to work, forgetting the boy was in the back seat.
Boring told the jury Harris’ account doesn’t make sense. He said the minutes before leaving his son to die, Harris posted an online message that read: “I love my son and all, but we both need escapes.”
He said Harris and his son ate breakfast just over half a mile from the Home Depot office where Harris worked as a computer technician, and Harris parked his SUV by backing up between two vehicles — which would have required looking over his shoulder toward the backseat where his son sat.
Later that day, Harris opened his vehicle to toss in a bag of lightbulbs he bought during his lunch break, Boring said. After leaving work, he drove a few miles to a shopping center without stopping, the prosecutor said, though police later reported the SUV reeked from “sweat, a dirty diaper, the smell of death.”
“Hold this man responsible for trying to escape from one life into another by killing a child in one of the most horrible, unimaginable ways possible,” Boring told the jury.
Boring said on the day Cooper died, his father sent more than 30 messages on his phone “mostly to women, mostly about sex.”
He said Harris was unhappy in his marriage to the boy’s mother and was obsessed with finding other sex partners. The month before his son died, Boring said, Harris met a prostitute for sex at a hotel. He had also been trying to persuade an underage, 17-year-old girl to send him a photo of her genitals. Harris was also charged for sending the girl sexually explicit text messages and photos.
Sixteen total jurors — eight men and eight women — were seated Monday morning to hear the case. Four of them will serve as alternate jurors, who will have a final say in the trial only if one more of the 12 main jurors are dismissed. The judge did not specify which jury members were alternates.
Harris, who moved to Georgia from Tuscaloosa, Alabama, in 2012, faces life in prison if he’s convicted of murder. Prosecutors decided not to seek the death penalty.
The Associated Press contributed to this article.
Fry him
Being slowly lowered into a barrel of acid would be humane for this POS.
I PRAY HE GETS LIFE IN PRISON.
Guilty as sin. No need for a trial. He’s gonna have plenty of sex in the shower in the pen but not the type he’d like.
This man meets the death penalty ….why should tax payers have to feed, clothe and house him for life. At least put him in an awful prison and tell the inmates what he did to his little child….he can get all the sex he wants while in there.
wandamurline …
. You are so right about you and me paying for his up keep. …
. Unfortunately it cost way more to do the right thing and execute him.
I’ll do it for free!!!!
too much evidence of guilt, get him to confess.
What a tragedy! Sin will always take you further than you want to go, cost you more than you want to pay and make you stay longer than you want to stay.
They never mention the mother here. God bless her who ever she is.
The MOTHER ? Where was she ? Obviously absent ? While I can not ever imagine leaving my child in a car while I went to work ? I was a single father , I took my children to work with me , We took toys & even television with netindos attached & I installed homes with carpet & flooring while they were on the job site , I am proud to say that all of my baby’s are full grown now & remember those days as fun on daddies job site , I dealt with 4 babies at 1st , two were still in diapers , Granted I was SELF employed & could them into my work environment ? & still be a parent & do my job , This man obviously did not have the resources to do what I did , Hence I ask again ? WHERE was the other half of this family ? My ex wife left me stranded with 4 kids , 2 still in diapers , Just walked away ! I was fortunate to be self employed & could control my work place , There where MANY days Jobs did NOT get done on time due to me being DAD on a job site ? But I was the boss ? I can not imagine leaving my baby’s alone while I was working ! Life went on 4 all of us ! They all grew up to be VERY strong AMERICANS !, WHERE WAS THE MOTHER ?
Your the best. I was a divorced, thus single mom and yes, self employed and yes, took my angel babies everywhere with me, until school. Then I sat in the school parking lot crying, thinking they must be needing me. Its a Mom thing. Anyway, God bless you and your family.
If he had drove straight to work, I maybe could have given him the benefit of a doubt, but not after taking him to eat, pulling him in and out of a car seat. No he definitely planned this child’s murder. He wants sex, let prison give him all he can stand and then some. He deserves everything he gets.
The death penalty really is what they should require. The system is to easy on these cases. He is guilty as hell. No excuses. People are so wrapped up in themselves these days.
What a terrible thing.
I ONLY KNOW THAT THIS MAN WILL SUFFER THE ETERNAL FLAMES OF HELL THROUGHOUT ETERNITY FOR HIS CRIME
IN KILLING HIS SON IN THE MOST HORRIBLE WAY POSSIBLE…..i CAN ONLY HOPE THAT HE REMEMBERS WHAT HE PUT HIS SON THROUGH IN THAT SO TERRIBLY HOT CAR…..I CAN ONLY THINK THAT HE WILL BE GETTING HIS JUST DESSERTS…..HIS SON IS NOW IN THE ARMS OF JESUS…..GOD BLESS HIM……….
& the CRISTIAN Bible speaks of GOD asking Men to KILL their 1st born son in sacrifice to him ? This has NOTHING to do with ANY gods ! Bad Parenting !I
You need to READ the Bible and not put your ignorant interpretation of One incident which was meant only as a test.
John …
. Thanks for clarifying that ignorant statement made to try to discredit GOD. …
. Not only was it one incident to test the father of faith but GOD stopped that sacrifice and said He would provide Himself a sacrifice. …
. Meaning He (Jesus) would be the once and for all the real sacrifice (antitype).
. If you see any sacrifice being made after the cross it can not be for the Creator GOD and must be to satan. …
. Such as the eucharist.
Horrible & unreasonable excuse to assert a father just didn’t think about his kid all day…Normal people get a normal nagging feeling when they’ve rushed that makes them backtrack..what’s wrong? & mentally go through a list…did I turn off the coffee pot? etc. You know replay your morning & think about your obligations…There’s just no way a functioning being would blank out loading a child in their car!!!! The guy obviously wasn’t preoccupied with a do or die work deadline or other task requiring he block everything else out to concentrate, since he was obviously wasting employee time sexting! That betrayal too should have triggered thoughts of Family….Doubt he’s ever forgotten more than 5 minutes if he’d left a doughnut or other treat in the car to spoil & rescued it in time to stuff his face…. His story shouts lack of normal human cognitive activity making him a brain-impared menace or he’s lying and killed intentionally making him a psycho menace.
The death penalty? That would be too easy. Put him in a hot vehicle, locked in and let him die a low-sweltering death. He’ll find out what hell is like.
How, How can an adult male leave his 22-month-old baby in a car and go to work like nothing happened. This worthless scumbag that is lower in life than whale-shit needs to die just like his son. Lock him in a solid steel 6X6X6 box, in direct sun light, with five vent holes so he will not die fast…toast him there until he draws his last breath…then cremate his ass in a bon-fire while the neighbors watch…that is what he deserves nothing less.
he must be given at least a life sentence the piece off poo