Teen charged with capital murder after lighting elderly veteran on fire

Tribune Interactive ^ | August 18, 2016 | Megan Miller

[Gamecock]

BIRMINGHAM – A teenager has been charged with capital murder after dousing his elderly neighbor in gasoline and lighting him on fire.

Thomas Sims, 18, was already awaiting trial in connection with an armed car jacking early this year, according to al.com. Sims is now charged with the murder of 85-year-old Gene Emory Dacus.

Authorities report the capital murder charge stems from the theft of Dacus’s truck, and detectives are searching for another suspect as well.

Officers responded to the 2300 block of 33rd Avenue North on Wednesday to investigate a person on fire. Officers found the victim, who is described as an 85-year-old white man, lying on the ground in the backyard of the listed location. He suffered severe burns, and was pronounced dead on the scene by Birmingham Fire and Rescue.

Witnesses reported seeing a fire in the backyard, and also seeing a black male fleeing the scene with a red gas jug. They followed Sims and notified the police of his location, so he was located a short distance away and taken into police custody.

[sport]

You haven't seen anything yet. The best [worse] is yet to come. There are at least two generations of those just like him and worse ripening and about to mature. They will have no principles, low morals, no sense of right and wrong, no conscience. The only engine that drives them will be the I want, I want, I want. Whatever steps they have to take to get it they will. In their minds, anything they want, they are entitled to and anyone that tells them nay must be done away with. It is happening at this moment. A “teen” decides he needs a crack rock to smoke. To obtain the money to buy it, he robs people. A policeman/woman tries to stop him and he shoots it out with the Officer and comes out second best. The media learns of it and and how do they report it? The media report it in a way to make the Officer the villain. All the "teen" was doing was trying to earn some money and along comes this big bad Officer and prevents him from doing so, not only that, the Officer shoots him.

[sphinx]

So, does he get street cred in prison, for setting an old man on fire and killing him that way??

No. He will get the street cred for killing a white person.

[T-Bone Texan]

I’m not Jewish, and I still believe in OT punishment.

“Sometimes, the old ways are best”.

[Exit148]

I didn’t have to see the picture to know what the eyes looked like.

[Carry me back]

Trials are overrated. If they know he did it. Just take him out back and kill’em.

[Ancesthntr]

No, don’t hang him.

Let the kids or grandkids of that vet mete out a punishment that fits the crime exactly - light HIM on fire.

[Ancesthntr]

“I’m Jewish and believe in the Old Testament. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth...”

---

Me, too.

...and a match and gasoline for a match and gasoline.

[Ancesthntr]

“Failing that, perhaps the victim has family in prison in who can ‘counsel’ Mr. Sims, while in prison.”

---

No, probably they don’t.

But they can sure grow their family by taking care of some kindly inmate’s family that’s outside of prison. :>)

[EinNYC]

First toss him in a barrel of battery acid. Then hang him. Then burn the remains and scatter the ashes in a pig pen. How could you set a living human on fire, an elderly man who only knew to do good? Contrast and compare him to this worthless waste of space and oxygen, who probably can’t name his father.

[fortes fortuna juvat]

Turn him over to ISIS with a note pinned to his forehead instructing them to put him in a cage and light him up.

[Captainpaintball]

Why do all these guys look like they have an IQ of 65? Is it the eyelids? the vacant stare?

Because a large percentage do have an IQ of 65.

[Captainpaintball]

Every day, another one of them gets to live, and a good person or two, or three...dies.

[Pollster1]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Alabama

“Alabama is the only state in which judges routinely override the jury’s decision not to impose the death penalty.” (No longer true)

I would hope that Alabama jurors would get this one right, since the judge can no longer fix that mistake. Fortunately, the evil thug gets his choice between a date with Old Sparky and with a needle. I don’t care what method is used, as long as this predator is removed from the population and can never again harm an innocent person or even a fellow criminal.

[ohioman]

Whether or not the death penalty is a deterrent does not matter. Justice in this case calls for death.

[Organic Panic]

Just diversifying the neighborhood.

[Secret Agent Man]

Black punk thug, old white guy. Hardly surprising.

[Secret Agent Man]

I now understand why those seats with wooden apex points on them were created.

[BlueLancer]

"I’m Jewish and believe in the Old Testament. An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth..."

And I'm not Jewish and I believe it as well.