25 March 2010 :

Gavin Scott receives life sentences instead of death. A man facing a death sentence for the 3rd time in a 1996 killing returned to court today and received consecutive life sentences rather than death. Gavin Scott, who appeared today in Sedgwick County District Court, pleaded guilty to 2 counts of 1st-degree murder. He will not be eligible for parole for 80 years. Scott had been scheduled for resentencing before a jury later this month to decide whether he should receive the death penalty for shooting Doug and Beth Brittain on Sept. 13, 1996. In August 1998, a jury found Scott, then 20, guilty of killing the Brittains, then decided he should die. But Judge David Kennedy threw out the death penalty verdict after learning that one of the jurors brought a Bible into deliberations. Another jury sentenced Scott to death in June 1999. Then in 2006, the Kansas Supreme Court ruled that juries in capital cases had been given instructions that incorrectly stated the law. That nullified the death sentences of several defendants, including Scott. On May 16, 2008 (see), the Kansas Supreme Court upheld Scott's conviction on the killings but ordered him to be resentenced. That proceeding was scheduled for this month.