Fed appeals panel upholds bar of videotape

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A federal appeals court says a Mississippi court did not err in barring jurors from seeing a videotape made by a former butcher who had claimed it might have prevented him getting a death sentence.

Gary Carl Simmons Jr. was convicted of capital murder in 1997 in Jackson County and sentenced to death for chopping up the body of a Texas drug dealer and raping the victim's girlfriend.

According to court documents, Simmons made the videotape shortly before his arrest. Simmons claimed in his motion for a new trial that he expressed remorse for his actions. Such a display could have resulted in a different sentence, Simmons contended.

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