The Georgia Department of Corrections on Friday set a Jan. 13 execution date for Andrew Howard Brannan, who murdered a 22-year-old Laurens County deputy during a 1998 traffic stop.
If Brannan is put to death by lethal injection, he will be second man Georgia has executed in little more than a month; Robert Holsey was executed on Dec. 9 for murdering a Baldwin County deputy.
In January 1998, Laurens County deputy Kyle Dinkheller stopped Brannan on Interstate 16 for speeding, driving at 98 mph.
All that happened after Brannan was pulled over was captured by a video camera on the deputy's car.
According to the video shown the jury, Brannan got out of his truck and ignored Dinkheller's demands that he take his hands out of his pockets.
Brannan swore at the deputy and began dancing on the road and yelling, "shoot me." At one point he yelled he was a "Vietnam combat veteran."
Then Brannan rushed the the deputy and they struggled for a few moments until Brannan ran back to his truck and got a .30 M-1 carbine. He shot Dinkheller nine times, including once at close range.
In the trial, Brannan's attorney said he was insane and asked the jury to find him not guilty. The defense lawyer said Brannan had post traumatic stress disorder and would have flashbacks to his experience Vietnam.
But according to the court-appointed psychiatrist, Brannan was sane.
PTSD is a genuine mental illness, but it rarely amounts to an insanity defense in a violent crime. People afflicted by PTSD are much more likely to curl up in a fetal position than to take a gun and shoot someone.
Leave a comment