FORT HOOD, Texas (Reuters) – The widow of a worker slain in the 2009 shooting rampage at Fort Hood, Texas, vowed not to let the killing by convicted gunman U.S. Army Major Nidal Hasan destroy her life and testified in a sentencing hearing on Tuesday that “he is not going to win.”
“The shooting is not going to destroy my life or my children’s. He is not going to win. I am in control,” said Joleen Cahill, whose husband, retired Chief Warrant Officer Michael Cahill, was one of 13 people murdered by Hasan at the central Texas military base.
Cahill testified at the sentencing phase for Hasan, an army psychiatrist who was convicted of 45 counts of premeditated murder and attempted premeditated murder.
Hasan could be sentenced to death by the military jury of 13 officers, who convicted him on Friday and are now weighing his punishment.
He killed 13 people and wounded 31 others, most of them unarmed soldiers.
It was the deadliest mass murder ever at a U.S. military base.
Twenty family members and shooting victims gave testimony during the sentencing phase, which began on Monday, recounting heart-wrenching stories of loss, grief and wounds.
Prosecutors rested their case at midday on Tuesday.
Following a lunch recess, Hasan will have the opportunity to address the jury deciding his fate. The Army psychiatrist has been acting as his own attorney.