Kendrick found guilty of first-degree murder in prison sergeant's death; jurors to consider sentence next week

Yahoo

29-03-2025

SOMERSET, Pa. – A state prison inmate will face the possibility of a death sentence next week for fatally assaulting Sgt. Mark Baserman in 2018 at SCI-Somerset.
Paul Jawon Kendrick, 29, was convicted of the most serious charge against him – first-degree murder – and four other counts Friday by a Somerset County jury.
Looks of relief swept over the faces of Baserman's family members in court as the jury foreman read the guilty verdicts aloud. Kendrick sat motionless between his defense attorneys, later wiping his eyes as jurors were polled, stood one at a time and confirmed they each agreed with the panel's findings.
Kendrick was acquitted of one aggravated assault charge related to then-corrections officer William McDowell Jr., who was struck several times while trying to stop Kendrick's attack on Baserman in an institutional recreation room Feb. 15, 2018.
But Kendrick was also convicted of assault by prisoner on McDowell and Baserman, and aggravated assault and assault causing serious bodily injury to Baserman, following the jury's nearly three hours of deliberation at the Somerset County Courthouse.
Neither side's attorneys had comment Friday while leaving the courtroom.
Somerset County District Attorney Molly Metzgar said her staff was switching focus to the upcoming capital 'penalty' sentencing phase of the trial. That phase will begin Tuesday.
Jurors will be reassembled in court to consider whether Kendrick, who is already serving a life prison sentence for an unrelated 2014 homicide in Pittsburgh, should be sent to death row.
That includes weighing 'aggravating' factors that would support sentencing Kendrick to death against 'mitigating' factors that would cause jurors to instead impose a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
It will be the first capital sentencing in Somerset County in decades, court officials have said.
Kendrick's trial ran for four days this week. It was also seven years in the making, delayed partly by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Unlike in many homicides, Kendrick didn't have a gun, a blade or a manifesto – but Somerset County First Assistant District Attorney Thomas Leiden told jurors that didn't matter.
During his closing argument, Leiden lifted one of Kendrick's blood-stained Timberland work boots before swinging it hard on the witness stand to remind jurors of its potential as a weapon.
Then he replayed surveillance video of the attack, pausing it to highlight moments Kendrick approached Baserman several times, apparently about the towel that Baserman had confiscated from Kendrick earlier that day.
Their final encounter started with Kendrick 'sucker-punching' Baserman, 60, and following up with a rapid flurry of punches toward the fallen guard's head, video showed.
After fighting off McDowell's attempt to stop the attack, Kendrick delivered a sprinting kick, in Leiden's words, 'as hard as a person could kick.'
'It was no accident,' Leiden said, likening the kick to an NFL punter's gameday approach. 'He wanted Mark dead.'
Defense attorney Tim Burns had a different view in his closing argument.
Defense attorneys didn't dispute that Kendrick was upset about the towel, which was confiscated after he used it to block his prison cell window, or that Kendrick attacked Baserman later that day. But they described the assault as a reckless act of impulse by Kendrick – that the inmate 'lost it' and began hitting Baserman in a fit of anger.
One inmate testified that Kendrick had his wisdom teeth removed earlier that morning. Burns questioned why anyone would carry out a planned attack in broad daylight with another corrections officer, McDowell, close by and dozens of inmates watching as witnesses.
'You saw it,' he said of the video, describing it as a 15- to 20-second attack that ended with Kendrick stopping on his own and then walking away.
Burns also noted that Baserman used prescribed blood thinners, which likely worsened his internal bleeding and swelling. The defense urged jurors to issue a manslaughter verdict.
Leiden called defense arguments 'red herrings' meant to raise doubt. Kendrick's intent was clear, he told jurors.
He pointed to a scene on the surveillance video in which he said it appeared the inmate tightened his loose boots just minutes before the attack. He also reminded the jury that corrections officers testified inmates often took that step before getting into fights in prison.
And there was no doubt that even though Baserman survived for 11 days afterward, much of that time in a coma, Kendrick's attack set off an 'unbroken chain' of medical events that led to Baserman's death, Leiden added.
A ForensicDx pathologist testified Wednesday that an autopsy showed Baserman suffered significant 'layers' of trauma to every lobe of his brain that caused swelling inside his skull. Pressure on his brain stem led Baserman's organs to fail before his death, Dr. Curtis Goldblatt said.
'Mark just wanted to go to work (that day), be fair and consistent ... and go home again,' Leiden said, adding that Baserman never got that chance: 'Instead, he died a slow death. And Paul Kendrick got exactly what he wanted.'