Ex-convict pleads guilty to murders Windham man’s sentence 3 life terms in N.H. slayings

CONCORD, N.H. – An ex-convict accused of a multistate crime spree this summer pleaded guilty Friday to killing three men in a botched robbery, but infuriated the victims’ families in the process.

Michael Woodbury, 31, apologized to each victim by name and to their families before being sentenced to consecutive terms of life in prison without parole. But he then essentially blamed others for the July 2 killings at the Army Barracks outdoors store in Conway.

He said he shot store manager James Walker of Denmark, Maine, because he thought Walker, 34, might have identified him as a wanted man and was reaching for a gun.

“I was on the fence whether to rob the place or not,” Woodbury said during the Merrimack County Superior Court hearing. “He started to reach under the counter and that’s when it really went bad.”

The other victims – store customers William Jones, 25, of Walpole, Mass., and his close friend Gary Jones, 23, of Halifax, Mass. – “tried to tackle me as I went out the door,” he said.

When Judge Edward Fitzgerald invited the families to speak, Gary Jones’ sister Stephanie Jones said she was pretty sure her brother would have tried to stop Woodbury.

But family members were scathing in rejecting Woodbury’s suggestions that the victims – and officials who let him out of prison in May – were to blame.

“You are a coward, a thief and a cold-blooded murderer,” Walker’s father, also named James, told Woodbury.

William Jones’ father, Ken Jones, said: “He killed my son, yet this monster sits here with a smirk on his face as if he was the victim.”

Woodbury of Windham, Maine, was released May 4 from the Maine State Prison after serving five years for robbery and theft. Authorities say he left the state a month later, heading south with two teenage sisters in a car allegedly stolen from their mother.

Woodbury is accused of robbing a bank in Florence, S.C., on June 6; breaking into a million-dollar home in St. Simons Island, Ga., and setting it on fire June 12; and holding up a clothing store June 19 in Chattanooga, Tenn., wielding a knife in a scuffle with the shop owner’s son before escaping.

Both sisters eventually broke away from Woodbury, one of them hiding from him in a gas station restroom the day before the Chattanooga robbery.

After his arrest for the murders, Woodbury said he had warned prison officials this spring he would be a danger.

“I reached out, asking for help. I reached out and told them I need medication. I reached out and told them I shouldn’t be out in society. I told numerous cops, numerous guards,” he told reporters outside a courthouse on July 5.

“I feared I was going to become a serial killer,” he added Friday in court.

Maine authorities said Woodbury had access to a wide variety of mental health services. They also said they had no jurisdiction over him because he was not on probation.

When the judge declined to let Woodbury speak at one point Friday, he scribbled a sign and pointed it toward the family members. “U have a lawsuit,” it said.

Early in the hearing, Fitzgerald and attorney Caroline Smith reviewed Woodbury’s history of mental problems, including bipolar disease, and his understanding of the process and his options. Smith said she discussed defenses based on his mental illness with Woodbury, but he rejected them.

“He showed me very clearly he understood the consequences of his choice not to pursue those defenses,” she said. “I have to honor his choice.”

Life without parole is mandatory in New Hampshire for first-degree murder. Though it makes no practical difference, Fitzgerald made the sentences consecutive.

Asked after the hearing whether Woodbury felt remorse, Smith said he did.

“He wanted to end further pain for the families,” she said.

Jennifer Blake, the dead manager’s sister, didn’t buy it.

“If [my brother] had been asked for money or the keys to his car, he would have gladly handed them over,” she told Fitzgerald. “It is clear from your [Woodbury’s] actions, your prior statements, your court outbursts, that you have no compassion, no conscience and no remorse.”

Fitzgerald said no one could understand the demons that made Woodbury do what he did and no court could provide justice for the victims’ families and friends.

“For the family members, I pray they may have some peace and closure,” he said in handing down the sentences. “As I said, I cannot do justice.”