McGowan killer gets life in prison

Signe McGowan cries when she sees a Virginia license plate and her heart races when she hears a knock at the door.

James McGowan, a lawyer in Syracuse, N.Y., finally understands the feelings of the grieving families who meet with him in wrongful death cases.

Things have not been the same since the couple’s youngest child, Jayne Warren McGowan, was slain Nov. 8, 2007, in her St. Clair Avenue apartment.

“I try so hard to carry on, but many times, I’m just going through the motions,” Signe McGowan said Monday in Charlottesville Circuit Court.

More than 20 of Jayne McGowan’s relatives and friends packed the rows nearest to the prosecutor Monday, listening to her immediate family tell the judge how her death has made them fearful and how William Douglas Gentry Jr. shouldn’t be a free man after shooting her.

He won’t be. Gentry, 23, will spend life in prison without the possibility of parole on a capital murder charge. Circuit Court Judge Edward L. Hogshire also sentenced him to life on a robbery charge, 50 years on a breaking and entering charge and 13 years total on three firearm charges.

Gentry and his cousin, Michael Stuart Pritchett, were charged with capital murder and other counts in connection with McGowan’s death. According to authorities, Gentry and Pritchett were looking for money when they saw McGowan’s computer through a window. McGowan, who was inside watching TV and ironing curtains for the AIDS/HIV Services Group’s 20th-anniversary gala she was planning, answered the knocks at the door after Gentry identified himself as Albemarle County police.

Authorities have said McGowan tried to give them money, but she didn’t have any. Gentry, who police said thought she was pulling a gun out of her purse, shot her in the head with a .22-caliber revolver. He shot her twice more while Pritchett sought out the laptop, police allege.

Pritchett is accused of firing a fourth shot with a .380-caliber semi-automatic pistol before the pair left in McGowan’s 2001 Nissan Sentra. The men were arrested Nov. 12, 2007.

Deputy Commonwealth’s Attorney Claude Worrell previously has said in court that the medical examiner’s report indicated the .380 bullet was “instantly fatal,” although her cause of death was multiple gunshot wounds. Defense attorney J. Lloyd Snook III said Monday in court that an expert he consulted indicated that the bullets his client fired would have stunned, not killed, McGowan.

In December 2008, Gentry pleaded guilty to capital murder, entering a home with the intent to commit a serious felony, robbery, use of a firearm in the commission of a robbery, use of a firearm in the commission of a burglary and use of a firearm in the commission of a murder. His pleas were entered as part of an agreement, under which the prosecution said it wouldn’t seek the death penalty as punishment for the capital charge.

Gentry kept his head down during most of the court proceedings Monday, his emotion showing only through a tense vein on his forehead or the occasional wipe of his eyes. When it came time for him to be sentenced, Gentry stood, looked at his victim’s family and calmly apologized.

“If I have to sit in prison for the rest of my life, I accept that,” Gentry said.

Gentry also said that it wasn’t his idea to commit crime that night, and he didn’t intend to hurt anyone. Authorities have said that Gentry and Pritchett have different recollections of what happened.

During court Monday, a few members of McGowan’s family expressed an interest in Gentry getting a life sentence, the maximum he could have received under the plea agreement. Snook said in court his reading of Virginia code said Hogshire could suspend all or part of a life sentence for his client, giving him a chance to leave prison alive.

Kate Reiter, one of McGowan’s older sisters, asked Hogshire to sentence Gentry to the maximum rather than giving him a second chance at freedom.

“The night of Jayne’s murder, he had three chances,” Reiter said. “She would have given anything to keep her life. He shot her. He was given a second chance, and he shot her again. She wasn’t dead yet. So then he shot her a third time.”

Pritchett is scheduled to have a five-day jury trial in June. The city’s commonwealth attorney’s office has said it will not seek the death penalty against him.