Barbara Kiss cried when a jury found the man who murdered her 22-year-old son guilty Thursday of first-degree homicide in Fayette County Common Pleas Court.
Nathaniel L. Stites Jr., 25, will spend the rest of his life in prison for savagely slaying Christopher "Bubby" Kiss in what Uniontown police officers called one of the bloodiest murders they have ever seen.
Kiss bled to death after being stabbed and slashed 35 times in the kitchen of his public housing home on Coolspring Street at about 3 a.m. on Oct. 19, 2001.
Stites, also of Uniontown, was arrested a short time later, hiding under a bed in a camper in Fairchance, near where he stashed a garbage bag filled with bloody clothing. After his arrest, he led police to Dunlap Street in the city and showed them where to recover the knife used in the murder.
Even without viewing horrific crime scene photographs, the jury of seven men and five women took about four hours yesterday to convict Stites. Judge Ralph C. Warman scheduled a sentencing hearing for Stites in his courtroom on April 30.
"But that's really just a formality," said District Attorney Nancy Vernon. First-degree criminal homicide carries "a mandatory sentence of life without parole."
Vernon -- who prosecuted the case along with Assistant District Attorney Joseph George -- said she was "satisfied" with the verdict.
"It's difficult for a jury to convict on first-degree homicide," she said. "But this case was just so brutal. He (Kiss) suffered a lot before he died."
Stites had testified that he consumed large quantities of drugs and alcohol prior to the killing, which he claimed was an act of self-defense. He told jurors he went three times to Kiss to obtain crack cocaine that night and became engaged in an altercation with him the third time, when the victim allegedly pulled a gun on him.
No firearms were found.
There was also testimony from Kiss' fiance, Adrienne Clark, and her brother, Edward "Rooster" Clark, that after Stite's repeatedly stabbed Kiss, he chased them to an upstairs bedroom and they barricaded themselves inside while Stites threatened to kill them because they had witnessed the murder.
"He (Kiss) was 22 years old and snuffed out in the beginning of the prime of his life," Vernon said. "He may not have been a choir boy. He may not have been an angel. But saint or sinner, he did not deserve to die."
"And that man over there had no license to kill," the district attorney added, pointing at Stites. She called Kiss' death "a willful, deliberate, premeditated killing with malice."
Stites -- who has been in the Fayette County Jail without bond since his arrest in October 2001 -- showed no visible reaction when the 5 p.m. verdict was rendered.
But a cheer erupted from a group of Kiss' family and friends, who attended each day of testimony this week.
"I am so happy," Barbara Kiss said, commending the jury, as well as Vernon and city police.
"They all did a wonderful job," she said. "I truly believe that justice has been served."
"This has affected my family drastically," she said of the brutal slaying. Christopher Kiss was one of her eight children. He had three sisters and four brothers, ranging in age from 13 to 29. "It's been hard on all of us."
"It took 1,500 stitches to put my son's neck back together for the funeral. He never liked turtleneck sweaters, but that's what we had to bury him in so we could have an open casket, and that's how his brothers and sisters and his kids got to see him," Kiss' mother said. "I think he (Stites) deserves what he got."
"Now my brother can rest in peace," added Valerie Kiss, 16, who still misses her brother and regrets that his three young children will grow up without their father.
"He had three kids who can't wake up and see their daddy ever again," she said. "One has never seen him. She was born after he was murdered."
