Richmond Hill trial: Jury finds Leonard guilty of all charges

SOUTH BEND – Two fathers, John Longworth and Don Buxton, listened Tuesday as a judge read the verdicts against the man accused of killing their children. Guilty, the judge said — 53 times.

Longworth was sitting in the second row of the courtroom with his family, at times with his eyes closed, listening to the judge. Buxton sat in the back, at times with his head down. More than 2 1/2 years after their children — John Dion and Jennifer Longworth — were lost forever, they watched the verdicts come down against Mark Leonard, who sat stone faced as the words rolled over him.

It took less than five minutes for the verdicts to be read. Deputies escorted Leonard from the courtroom in shackles. Dion's mother, Elaine Sgorcea, sat crying as Leonard walked by. Longworth walked over to Marion County Deputy Prosecutor Denise Robinson, one of two attorneys who brought the case against Leonard. He reached out to shake her hand.

"You're welcome," she told him.

A key episode in a nightmare that began on Nov. 10, 2012, had come to an end. The jury of six men and six women took less than four hours to find Leonard guilty of all 53 charges — including four counts of murder — for masterminding a massive explosion that registered on an earthquake monitor more than 20 miles away, leveled one house and destroyed dozens of others in the Richmond Hill neighborhood on Indianapolis' Southeastside.

The guilty verdict on the most serious charge — two counts of knowing murder — means Leonard's trial, already one of the longest in Indiana history, is not completely over. A second phase begins Wednesday, when St. Joseph Superior Court Judge John Marnocha will decide whether Leonard should be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.

To an extent, that's a moot point. The guilty verdicts on all the charges could add up to 300 years in prison.

The verdicts came after five weeks of testimony in South Bend, where the case was moved because of heavy pretrial publicity in Indianapolis. Throughout the trial, the two fathers sat through the testimony. Always, Longworth sat in the second row with a yellow pad in his lap, taking notes so he could update the entire family about the trial. The fathers agreed: The jury's decision was the right one, but whether justice had been served, they were not sure. Their children are still dead.

"This doesn't change anything. It means he won't hurt anybody else outside of prison," said Longworth, Dion's father. "Dion and Jennifer are still not with me."

The decision was a relief for Buxton, Jennifer's father. He called his daughter the "backbone" of their family and said the conviction is "as close as we're going to get" to justice.

"As far as I'm concerned, the Leonard gang has sentenced my family to outdoor prison for the rest of our lives," Buxton said. "My wife always talks about what she won't have with her daughter, you know — going shopping and taking care of her kids and all of these things. We won't have any of that."

Leonard's legal team's attempt to mount a defense proved an impossible task.

Prosecutors took testimony from nearly 175 witnesses. Jurors heard from Leonard's ex-girlfriend, Monserrate Shirley, who said Leonard cooked up the arson scheme from its inception to collect insurance money. They heard from Leonard's longtime friend, a key state witness, whom he allegedly tried to kill in a murder-for-hire scheme. They heard from the officer who posed as the hit man. Neighbors lined up to testify about their lost property and lost sense of security. And there were horrifying accounts about Dion Longworth's death — he burned to death in his basement as firefighters were helpless to rescue him. His wife had already perished.

Then, there was the sheer scope of the explosion itself.

"When you see a picture of a neighborhood that's been blown up," public defender David Shircliff said, "that's a pretty damning piece of evidence."

Shircliff said defense attorneys will appeal the convictions. They tried but failed to keep evidence of the hit man Leonard tried to hire away from jurors, saying it wasn't relevant to the crime. They complained prosecutors held back information. They repeatedly sought a mistrial.

Once the trial began, the defense attorneys did nothing to deny Leonard's involvement in the arson scheme. Instead, they sought to put most of the blame on Shirley, who owned the home that exploded, and to discredit her account of the plot. They also tried to claim Leonard didn't expect anyone to die in what was supposed to be "a small fire." In the end, none of it mattered to jurors.

Marion County Prosecutor Terry Curry said Leonard's conviction does nothing to relieve the victims' grief, but it and Shirley's guilty plea are "two significant steps in achieving justice that we pledged to the residents of Richmond Hill."

"Today's verdict confirmed what was apparent to the investigators virtually from the first day," Curry said. "That the explosion that had occurred...was a senseless and criminal act that resulted in the horrific death of Dion and Jennifer Longworth..."

Curry said he expects Leonard to spend the rest of his life in prison.

John Longworth said he would find it impossible to forgive Leonard. Forgiving, he said, means that what he did is OK. It isn't.

"I have to let go of it every day," the father of three said.

Listening to all the testimony was hard, Longworth said, adding he is unsure how often he will attend the January trial of Leonard's half brother and co-defendant, Robert Leonard Jr. That trial will be in Fort Wayne.

"This was painful," he said. "I don't want to go through it again."

There had been times when he was angry about his only son's death. But he said he does not want to hold a grudge. Standing outside the courthouse after the verdict, Longworth didn't seem as if he was celebrating.

"Sentencing somebody to prison isn't anything to be happy about," he said. "Everything about this is sad."

During one of the court sessions, Longworth brought copies of the book "The Will of God" by Leslie D. Weatherhead. He said the book — about dealing with loss — best describes his view of life and how he copes with grief.

He said he's considering sending Mark Leonard a copy.

Star reporters Jill Disis, Gabby Ferreira, Ellen Garrison and Stephanie Wang contributed to this story. Call Star reporter Kristine Guerra at (317) 444-6209. Follow her on Twitter: @kristine_guerra.