Published: July 17, 2008 05:56 pm            

MAN CONVICTED OF SHOOTING DAUGHTER

Henry L. Lamb guilty of attempting to shoot another daughter, as well

vanessa.fultz@gaflnews.com



A man arrested last August for shooting his daughter twice and attempting to shoot another of his daughters was convicted by a Suwannee County jury Wednesday. Henry L. Lamb, 56, of 21214 51st Dr., Lake City, was found guilty of attempted first degree murder of daughter Loretta (Lorye) Lamb, attempted second degree murder of daughter Lisa Sanderson, assault against granddaughter Rashietta Jones, burglary while armed, grand theft of a motor vehicle and fleeing a police officer at a high speed.

ON THE STAND



The court heard 11 witnesses Tuesday, the first day of Lamb's trial.

Loretta Lamb testified that she was living with her sister Lisa Sanderson on 77th Drive in Live Oak on August 28, 2007, the day of the shooting. She told the jury she had just walked her children to the school bus and had come back to the house to do some chores. While she was vacuuming, Henry Lamb slipped into the house uninvited and shot her in the chest with a rifle. Loretta Lamb didn't hear the gun go off but felt her chest burn.

"I thought the vacuum cleaner exploded and that there was plastic imbedded in my chest," she said.

Loretta Lamb turned to ask her sister to take her to the hospital when she heard a "popping" noise, she said. She had been shot again, this time in the back. And this time she realized that the burning sensation was from a gunshot.

"Daddy, what have you done!" Loretta told jurors she remembered her sister screaming that day.

Lamb then aimed the gun at his other daughter, Sanderson, according to testimony.

"Daddy, please don't shoot her, she just had surgery," Loretta told jurors she recalled saying.

Lamb pulled the trigger of his .22 caliber rifle twice. It misfired both times.

Loretta's daughter, Rashietta Jones, was awakened by the commotion and came down the hall.

"I saw my mom and aunt standing at the kitchen being held at gun point," Jones told the jury tearfully. "He pointed it at me and I ran."

Jones ran down the hall and locked herself in the bathroom.

"'Daddy, please give me a minute I can't hardly breathe,'" Loretta Lamb remembered pleading, after Henry Lamb ordered both women to the floor.

Henry Lamb then took Sanderson's car keys and cell phone -- the only means of communication in the house -- and left.

"'No, momma, no,'" Loretta remembered her daughter saying when Jones came into the living room and saw blood everywhere.

One bullet fractured her rib. The other caused Loretta Lamb’s lung to collapse.

Loretta Lamb appeared distraught as she pulled up her shirt to show the jury her scars. She said one bullet is still logged in her lung.

According to testimony, the sisters' mother and father had separated several times and Henry Lamb was angry with them because they wouldn't persuade their mother to come back to him.

"I couldn't help my dad anymore," Loretta told the jury.

"He said we turned our back on him," Sanderson testified. "He said we were going to hurt like we made him hurt."

As Lamb attempted to flee the scene, a neighbor, Marty Brown, was approaching the Sanderson's yard to pick up a gas can. Brown told the jury that Lamb was walking "briskly" to Sanderson's truck.

"Lisa stuck her head out the door and hollered, 'My daddy's just shot my sister. He's got a gun. Be careful,'" Brown recounted.

Brown told the court he backed his truck behind Sanderson's to block Henry Lamb's escape, but that Lamb drove over a pile of brush and got away.

Lamb abandoned Sanderson's vehicle for his own and was later caught by police after a high-speed chase.

Suwannee County Sheriff's Deputy Martin Lee collected evidence at the scene. Lee said he found a .22 caliber rifle and four bullets -- two live and two spent rounds -- at the scene.

Lee told the jury that at least five law enforcement officials chased Henry Lamb -- a pursuit that reached speeds of up to 100 mph. After driving into a field, Lamb crashed into a bushy area and he surrendered, Lee said.

Lee said he discovered a box of .22 caliber bullets on Lamb's person.

Sgt. Jeff Cameron, an SCSO investigator, said at the hospital he stood beside the doctor and watched him make a 3-inch incision on Loretta Lamb's right side to retrieve a .22 caliber bullet. The doctor then turned the bullet over to Cameron.

Christopher Byrd, the postmaster in Branford at the time, testified that Henry Lamb came to the post office on August 27, 2007, the day before the shooting, to cancel his post office box.

"He declined to fill out a change of address," Byrd testified. "He said he was going to prison and he couldn't receive mail there."

Sgt. Chris Fry, another SCSO investigator, testified that he found a living will and a letter written to Lamb's girlfriend, Jeannie Fairley, at Henry Lamb's home.

Fry testified the letter was Henry Lamb's will. In it he left Fairley all his money and possessions. He left his family members $1 each, Fry testified. The letter was dated August 27, 2007.



CLOSING ARGUMENTS

"He pulled out his gun and shot her in her breast, in her left breast, where her heart and lungs and diaphragm were capable of being hit ... and when she was in pain and gasping for air, he shot her again," prosecutor Kim Sedor told the jury during closing arguments. "The defendant is guilty of attempted first degree murder as charged."

John Hendrick, Henry Lamb's defense attorney, countered:

"What was his purpose for going over there?" he asked rhetorically. "Was it as the state said to kill somebody or was it instead to get information from his daughters to either confront (his wife) who he thought would be there or find out from his daughters where she was? We don't know what happened inside that house that changed things."

"What it sounds like to me is that he went over to their house to kill himself," Hendrick added.



DELIBERATIONS

It took the jury about 90 minutes to reach a verdict. The jury found Lamb guilty as charged on four out of six counts. He was convicted of lesser offenses on the other two counts.

Lamb is being held at the Suwannee County Jail without bond. Sentencing is scheduled for August 7.

        

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