Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, April 7, 1991 TAG: 9104070175
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
In a telephone interview from his cell at the Augusta Correctional Center, 44-year-old Minor Junior Smith told the newspaper: "I pulled the gun out of a duffel bag and kept shooting.
"I shot all of the bullets out of the gun. . . . I panicked," Smith said.
Smith, a longtime prison inmate, said he gave a full confession to state police in August after they questioned him about his role in the slaying of Bard Edrington Fitzgerald Jr.
Fitgerald, the 36-year-old father of three young children, was found dead in his car in the parking lot of a Bedford County store along U.S. 460 on Sept. 2, 1967.
State police say they developed a case against Smith after getting a new lead on the case in 1987. A Bedford County grand jury indicted Smith on Friday on charges of capital murder and robbery.
State police allege that Smith, who was hitchhiking in the Lynchburg area, shot Fitzgerald while robbing him of a small amount of money.
In the telephone interview, Smith said that he fled the Bedford County parking lot and eventually rode a cab into Roanoke, paying the driver the $2 he'd found in Fitzgerald's wallet.
Smith said Fitzgerald's last words still haunt him.
"The last thing he said was, `Oh, God. What will happen to my children?' "
Asked on Saturday about his client's comments, Public Defender Webster Hogeland declined comment.
Smith could not be contacted Saturday at the Craigsville prison, where he is serving a life sentence in a separate murder case.
An assistant warden at the correctional center said that Smith had chosen to decline further requests for interviews following a conversation with his attorney on Saturday.
In 1971, Smith pleaded guilty to the murder of a 53-year-old Charlottesville storekeeper.
In the Bedford case, Smith could face the death penalty if convicted.
A Montgomery County native, Smith has spent most of his adult life in schools for the blind and in the Virginia prison system.
Staff writer Monica Davey contributed to this report.
by CNB