A man previously convicted of killing a Stonewall child more than 13 years ago soon will be in the courtroom again as his second trial is expected to get underway before month’s end.
Pre-trial matters related to jury selection in Brian Horn’s capital murder trial will be handled Monday in the Vernon Parish Courthouse in Leesville. Court personnel will return June 19 to begin jury selection.
Once selected, the jurors will be taken to DeSoto Parish for the trial proceedings. Prosecutors are hoping to start the trial on June 26.
Horn is accused of first-degree murder in the March 30, 2010 death of 12-year-old Justin Bloxom, a North DeSoto Middle School student.
Jurors are being picked in another parish because of extensive publicity about Justin’s death and Horn’s arrest. The first jury that convicted him in 2014 was made up of East Baton Rouge residents.
Horn sat on death row at Louisiana State Penitentiary in Angola until the fall of 2018, when the Louisiana Supreme Court overturned his conviction and death sentence because of precedent set by another case. In both cases, the defendants accused their attorneys of conceding their guilt before the juries without their approval.
At his trial, Horn’s attorneys claimed Justin’s death was accidental and did not warrant a first-degree murder conviction and death sentence.
DeSoto District Attorney Charles Adams is again seeking the death penalty in the case.
Horn is a twice-convicted sex offender, having served time in a Missouri prison for felony sexual assault. Still, he was able to get a job as a taxicab driver in Shreveport in 2010.
Two weeks after he was hired, Horn, posing as a 15-year-old girl, communicated via text messages to Justin and set up a meeting. The “girl” told Justin she was sending a taxi to pick him up from a friend’s house.
Instead, it was Horn who showed up. He picked up Justin then his taxi ran out of gas on U.S. Highway 171 just south of the school complex.
Prosecutors said Horn held Justin against his will in the car, before killing him and disposing of his body in a shallow pool of water in a wooded area across a fence. Sightings of the taxi in the area quickly led to Horn and his arrest.
Justin died of asphyxiation.
That taxicab company no longer exists. And a new law in Louisiana and other states – called Justin’s Law – puts employment restrictions on violent sex offenders.
Horn sought to have his prior sex offense convictions omitted from his murder trial. However, the Louisiana Supreme Court in February reinstated DeSoto District Judge Amy Burford McCartney’s pre-trial determination that Horn’s crimes can be included in his capital murder trial.