Life or death?

The jury retired yesterday afternoon, 49 days after the trial began, more than a year after Scanlan confessed to a slew of crimes and roughly 19 months after Alice Martel was fatally shot during the armed takeover of a Wells Fargo Bank in Burlingame.

Scanlan, a 26-year-old former Trader Joe's clerk from Mountain View, has repeatedly asked for the death penalty although he told the jury last Thursday that he personally opposes capital punishment. In his closing remarks yesterday morning, prosecutor Steve Wagstaffe urged the jury to impose death because of the crime, not because of Scanlan's unusual plea for capital punishment.

"The minute he shot and killed Alice Martel on Oct. 11, no matter what else he did in his life, the punishment is life without parole. No matter if he is Mother Teresa or did any other good things, that is the punishment at a minimum. To give that and not death, though, would mean that all those other 24 victims, the six people he tried to kill, all that counts for nothing," Wagstaffe said.

His defense attorneys, though, are pushing for life in prison without parole. Attorney Cliff Cretan focused on Scanlan's remorse and his eventual surrender. He told the jury that his client took responsibility for his crimes.

During closing remarks, the victims of Scanlan's crime spree sat in the audience along with his mother. The jury began deliberating at 2:30 p.m. and spent two hours without an answer.

If Scanlan is sentenced to death his conviction will automatically face appeal under California law. But because his guilt has never been in question, the only victory an appeal might garner is a life sentence in place of death.

In reaching its decision, the jury must reconcile the different descriptions of Scanlan it was presented during nearly one month of testimony. The defense painted him as a frustrated young man, beset by diabetes and by the memory of an alcoholic, abusive father who died when he was 10. Friends and family spoke of how wonderful he was with children and how his siblings were raised under the iron fist of his father in American Samoa.

The prosecution countered with a portrait of an angry man, more willing to rob and steal than try to make an honest living. Scanlan himself agreed that he was a violent person, particularly when drunk, and had little control of his emotions when angry.

Neither side bickered over whether Scanlan actually fired the .40-caliber Glock bullet that killed Martel on Oct. 11, 2002. What was argued, though, was intent. Scanlan said he never meant to kill Martel; the shot was supposed to be a warning. Wagstaffe said he knew what he was doing, had fired warning shots before and meant to murder Martel.

Scanlan testified for two days on his own behalf. He said many times that he knew what he was doing by pleading guilty and asking for death. He promised that his request was not a ploy to sidestep capital punishment by making the jury not want to give it to him after all.

Scanlan pleaded guilty to a dozen felonies, including the first-degree murder of Martel. He's even offered to plead guilty to crimes attributed to his accomplices.