PITTSBURGH—Most prospective jurors said Monday that if they were to convict a man of killing 11 worshippers at a Pittsburgh synagogue in the deadliest antisemitic attack in U.S. history, they would be capable of sentencing him to die.
The first day of Jury selection concluded in the trial of 50-year-old Robert G. Bowers, who faces 63 counts in the Oct. 27, 2018, attack at the Tree of Life synagogue, where members of three Jewish congregations were holding Sabbath activities. The charges include 11 counts of obstruction of free exercise of religion resulting in death and 11 counts of hate crimes resulting in death.
Bowers, a truck driver from the Pittsburgh suburb of Baldwin, could get the death sentence if convicted. He offered to plead guilty in return for a life sentence, but federal prosecutors turned him down even though Joe Biden pledged while campaigning for president three years ago that, if elected, he would work to end the federal death penalty. Bowers’ lawyers also recently said he has schizophrenia and structural and functional brain impairments….