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HOUSTON - The punishment phase for Gerald Goines' murder trial is now on hold after Goines was rushed to the hospital from the courthouse.
Several of Goines' loved ones yelled out in a panic as he suffered a medical emergency late Thursday morning in the middle of sentencing phase closing arguments.
It was five minutes into the prosecutor's closing argument and Goines became rigid in his seat, his mouth dropped slightly open, and there was a blank stare in his eyes.
Judge Veronica Nelson stopped the proceedings, excused jurors, and as the former Houston Police Narcotics Officer was helped from the courtroom, his breathing was labored and paramedics were called to help.
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Gerald Goines rushed out of court on gurney
Former Houston police officer Gerald Goines had an apparent medical emergency on Thursday and was taken from the courtroom on a gurney. The episode happened during the sentencing phase for Goines, who was recently convicted of murder. He could spend up to life in prison.
Goines', who just turned 60-years-old on Wednesday, was found guilty of felony murder last week, was clearly having his heart monitored as he was rushed out. He was taken on a stretcher from the courthouse, hooked up to ECG electrodes on his chest and on oxygen.
This happened, interrupting punishment phase closing arguments, shortly after defense attorney Nicole Deborde told jurors Goines is a "broken man…He's an old 60. His health is destroyed...five years is more than enough, along with the conviction he already has, to punish a man who will never stop punishing himself, until he takes his very last breath."
Prosecutor Tanisha Manning, however, told jurors don't be manipulated. She said investigators uncovered "a pattern of corruption" where Goines "planted drugs on people in neighborhoods he was supposed to be protecting." Manning also called Goines, "shameful, underhanded, untrustworthy, and a corrupt cop" just before his medical episode.
Deborde says Goines was left with severe health problems after he and three other officers were shot in 2019 while serving that no-knock warrant that killed Rhogena Nicholas and Dennis Tuttle. It's for their deaths that Goines was convicted of felony murder, since he lied to secure the search warrant for their Harding Street home.
Some of the couple's supporters want Goines to receive the maximum sentence, life in prison.
"Yes. Yes. He took the other two lives of my neighbors...it'll be an example for the other law enforcement that are not doing, protecting and serving the public," says Joseph, who lives on Harding Street.
Goines, a 34-year veteran of the Houston Police Department, was two weeks from retirement when the fatal no-knock raid occurred.
The former officer faces a punishment range of five years to life in prison. Closing arguments are set to continue on Monday at 9 a.m. if Goines is out of the hospital by then.