A judge on Saturday sentenced the man who killed four people during a brazen courthouse escape to multiple life sentences with no chance of parole , and to hundreds more years on more than 50 charges .
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judge saturday sentence man kill people brazen courthouse escape multiple life sentence chance parole hundred year 50 charge
A judge on Saturday sentenced the man who killed four <m> people </m> during a brazen courthouse escape to multiple life sentences with no chance of parole , and to hundreds more years on more than 50 charges .
A judge on Saturday sentenced the man who killed four <m> people </m> during a brazen courthouse escape to multiple life sentences with no chance of parole , and to hundreds more years on more than 50 charges .
The man , Brian G. Nichols , 37 , was found guilty last month of murder and dozens of other counts in the March 2005 rampage that led from a downtown courthouse to an Atlanta neighborhood and which ended with his capture the next day in a suburban county .
Judge James G. Bodiford of Superior Court handed down the maximum sentence on each charge , to run consecutively .
`` If there was any more I could give you , I would , '' Judge Bodiford said .
Mr. Nichols was spared multiple death sentences when the jury failed to reach a unanimous decision , as required by Georgia law , recommending that punishment .
The sentence ends more than three years of efforts to bring Mr. Nichols to justice since his arrest , frustrating victims ' relatives and angering state legislators over the costs .
Mr. Nichols escaped on March 11 , 2005 , as he was being escorted to a trial for rape .
He beat a deputy guarding him and stole her gun .
He burst into the courtroom and shot and killed Judge Rowland Barnes ; a court reporter , Julie Ann Brandau ; and Sgt. Hoyt Teasley , a Fulton County sheriff 's deputy .
Mr. Nichols fled downtown Atlanta and managed to evade hundreds of police officers overnight .
In the Buckhead neighborhood of Atlanta , he shot and killed a federal immigration and customs agent , David Wilhelm , at a house the agent was renovating .
Mr. Nichols was captured the next day in suburban Gwinnett County after a woman he took hostage , Ashley Smith Robinson , alerted the police .
Ms. Smith Robinson was credited with bringing a peaceful ending to the rampage by appealing to Mr. Nichols 's religious beliefs and giving him illegal drugs .
Mr. Nichols , who was raised in Baltimore , confessed to the killings but said that he was legally insane and that he believed he was a slave rebelling against his masters .
Prosecutors argued that he concocted the delusions to avoid the death penalty .
Mr. Nichols 's rampage led lawyers and judges to question their safety , and officials around the state re-examined courthouse security measures .