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Death watch

Two Philadelphia juries are deliberating in death penalty cases

Pennsylvania juries have rarely imposed the death penalty in recent years, so it's unusual that two Philadelphia Common Pleas Court juries are now sitting in cases where death by lethal injection could be imposed.

On the 10th floor of the city's Criminal Justice Center, a jury will begin hearing evidence Thursday before deciding if Fernando Real, 31, should be put to death or spend the rest of his life in prison without chance of parole for a double murder in 2002 in Frankford.

The Common Pleas Court jury deliberated about three hours Tuesday before find Real guilty of first-degree murder in the Sept. 9 shootings of Byron Story and Marcus Herbert, both 18, in what police called a drug-related robbery-murder. Both teens were shot about 4:30 a.m. outside Herbert's home in the 5200 block of Hawthorne Street. Story was shot in the head and died on the sidewalk; Herbert was shot twice in the back and died 13 months later.

When the jury returns it will hear evidence from Assistant District Attorney Gail Fairman about "aggravating factors" that arguably warrant a death sentence. Defense attorneys Gerald A. Stein and William L. Bowe will then present mitigating evidence they will argue justifies a life sentence with no parole.

Fairman is certain to argue that the double-murder and Real's daunting criminal history justify a death sentence. Real was not charged in the Story-Herbert killings until 2007. By that point he was already two years into a life sentence after being convicted of another 2002 murder. He also pleaded guilty in two incidents in September 2004 in which he stabbed and seriously wounded two fellow inmates with a smuggled homemade knife.

One floor above, another Common Pleas Court jury will soon begin deliberating in the murder trial of Rahmik Beckett, 24, accused of killing 24-year-old Kevin Jones during a Sept. 28, 2011 shootout at 32d and Tasker Streets in South Philadelphia.

Assistant District Attorney Brendan O'Malley and defense attorney Lawrence S. Krasner are making their closing arguments today. Judge Rose Marie DeFino-Nastasi will then instruct the jury in the relevant law and the jury will decide if Beckett is guilty.

At a preliminary hearing two years ago, Krasner argued that Beckett shot in self-defense at Jones. O'Malley, however, maintained that it was impossible to reconcile a self-defense claim with Jones' eight bullet wounds, some of which Beckett allegedly fired while standing over Jones' prone body.

According to state prison records, no people have been sentenced to death so far this year in Pennsylvania. Last year, there were four death sentences: one from Philadelphia, two from Westmoreland County and one from York County.

There are now 190 people, including three women, awaiting execution on death rows in five state prisons. Since Pennsylvania reenacted capital punishment in 1978, only three people have been executed: two in 1995 and the last in 1999 and only because they gave up all appeals and asked to be executed.