DATE: Friday, August 15, 1997               TAG: 9708150719

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: BY JON FRANK, STAFF WRITER 

DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH                    LENGTH:   92 lines

JURY TO GET CASE OF BOY ACCUSED IN SISTER'S DEATH JURORS WILL DECIDE IF GIRL'S DEATH WAS MURDER, OR ACCIDENT.

The second murder trial of 15-year-old Zackary Anthony Carter will go to the jury today after following the events of the first trial like the script of a play.

Even Circuit Judge Frederick B. Lowe, while addressing attorneys on Thursday after releasing the jury for the evening, admitted that ``the evidence unfolded basically as it did in the prior trial.''

But prosecutors, defense attorneys and family members hope the second trial - to determine whether it was murder or an accident when Carter killed his 8-year-old half-sister on Sept. 10 - will end with a far different result.

Trial No. 1, after one of the longest jury deliberations in Virginia Beach history, concluded June 6 when a juror contacted a private attorney not involved in the case to ask for advice.

Lowe, who also presided overthe first trial, called the contact ``improper communication'' and declared a mistrial.

At the time, the jury was about to begin its fourth day of deliberations. Jury members interviewed afterward said they were within one vote of convicting Carter of second-degree murder.

On Monday, more than two months later, all of the parties met at the Virginia Beach Circuit Courthouse to try again.

Carter is accused of using his father's shotgun to shoot Cierra Rose Carter in the upstairs bedroom of their home in the Ocean Lakes subdivision of Virginia Beach. The two were home alone at the time.

Carter then tried to cover up the murder scene by using cleansers to scrub blood-splattered walls, and by hiding his sister's body in the tub of an upstairs bathroom.

After his stepmother arrived home from work, Carter ran away from home. He spent the night in nearby woods, and was picked up by police a day later wandering along the streets of his subdivision.

Carter is the first juvenile to be tried for murder in Virginia Beach under a new state statute that took effect in July 1996. It requires that all teen-agers 14 and older be automatically tried as adults when charged with murder, rape or maiming.

On Thursday, Carter testified for nearly two hours, claiming that his finger ``snagged on the trigger'' of his father's 20-gauge shotgun as he sat on his bed last September.

His half-sister, Carter said, was sitting on a bean-bag chair at the foot of the bed and was accidentally struck in the temple by the shotgun blast.

``Did you have any intention of hurting her?'' asked defense attorney Melinda Glaubke.

``Never,'' Carter testified.

Carter, formerly a student at Princess Anne Middle School, said a drawing that he made as a school assignment several days before the shooting was not intended to show malice toward his half-sister.

The drawing, entered as evidence in both trials, shows a knife hovering over a picture of Cierra. The drawing also depicts Carter holding the knife, with his parents in the background.

``I loved her,'' Carter explained. ``She was my sister.''

But prosecutors believe Carter was jealous of his half-sister. They think he killed her out of sibling rivalry and because he feared he would be sent back to western Virginia to live with his mother after getting in trouble at school on the day of the shooting.

``You were concerned about going back to live with your mom?'' asked prosecutor Bob Dautrich on Thursday.

``It had crossed my mind,'' Carter said.

Carter said his concern about being sent back to his mother, however, had nothing to do with his sister's death.

He said he was playing with his father's shotgun in his bedroom before his sister got home from school and accidentally fired it once into the mattress.

When Cierra got home and came into his room, Carter said, he tried to hide the gun on his bed. When his sister sat down in the beanbag chair at the end of the bed, Carter said, he reached back to grab some shells that also were on the bed.

``I leaned back and my finger accidentally snagged the trigger and it went off,'' Carter said.

Moments later, Carter testified, he tried to shoot himself with the gun, but ``chickened out.'' The shotgun fired a third time, striking the ceiling.

Carter made a statement to a police investigator on the day of his arrest in which he said the shooting was not accidental.

On Thursday he testified that he made that admission because the police investigator ``pretty well told me he did not think it was an accident.''

Prosecutors on Thursday also showed a notebook that Carter wrote in on the night of his sister's death. Some of the writing was pornographic.

``That doesn't show too much concern for your sister, does it?'' asked prosecutor Bob Dautrich.

``I guess it does not,'' Carter testified. ``But I did have concern for my sister.'' ILLUSTRATION: [Color Photo]

ZACKARY ANTHONY CARTER is the first Virginia Beach juvenile to be

tried for murder under a new state statute that requires all

teen-agers 14 and older to be automatically tried as adults. KEYWORDS: JUVENILE MURDER TRIAL

Send Suggestions or Comments to webmaster@scholar.lib.vt.edu