By Brian Anderson
Valley Times

Aug. 28, 2001

OAKLAND — Faced with raising his son but fearing being fired, Thomas Wheelock plotted then carried out an armored car robbery that netted nearly $300,000 in cash and left a Pittsburg father dead, a prosecutor said Monday.

During closing arguments in the death penalty case against the former San Ramon man, Assistant District Attorney Jim Anderson told an Alameda County jury that Wheelock was a self-absorbed, habitual liar bent on murder and robbery.

"This defendant has lied and concealed his whole life to get what he wants," Anderson told the five-man, seven-woman jury. "He felt bad for himself and nobody else."

For about two hours Monday, Anderson tried to poke holes in a defense argument that Wheelock emotionally exploded Nov. 24, 1997, after his fellow Armored Transport guard, Rodrigo Cortez, berated the man.

He characterized Wheelock as a "little manipulator" with an "attitude of larceny and theft" and reminded jurors of a "manifesto" the former California High student penned while on a Caribbean cruise the week before the slaying.

Wheelock, Anderson said in his last chance to persuade jurors before deliberations begin today, was guilty of nothing less than first-degree murder.

"If you don't think this is deliberate -- first-degree murder -- I've got a bridge for you," he said.

But Assistant Public Defender Michael Ogul tried to beat back that argument, recalling witness testimony that Cortez was a "drill sergeant-type" man who verbally gunned for Wheelock after the rookie guard screwed up on the job.

Cortez swore and belittled Wheelock in front of others with such fury that a worker at one stop on their cash-hauling run warned the man to ease up because his young partner might strike out.

Wheelock trembled at the defense table as Ogul roared through the string of obscenities that his client said Cortez spewed before being shot.

"After all of that, Rod Cortez finally pushed Tom Wheelock over the edge," Ogul said. "He couldn't take it anymore. That is the truth."

Outside the courtroom, the victim's widow Marlene Cortez derided the defense for painting her husband as an abusive man.

"It's hard sitting in there and listening to all the lies," she said. "He could never say those words. They can say anything they want because he's not here to defend himself."

Wheelock's father, Gerald Wheelock, who testified during the month-long trial, declined to comment as he led other family members out of the courtroom.

In what turned into a tit-for-tat exchange between two heavy-hitting attorneys on opposite sides, Ogul accused Anderson of giving jurors only half the story. Anderson, he said, did not have the guts or integrity to tell jurors that Wheelock told investigators shortly after his arrest in Utah that he had "just flipped out."

Anderson swatted back, accusing Ogul of coaching Wheelock dozens of times on what to say when called to the stand. Wheelock -- not the prosecutor -- was the bad guy, Anderson said.

The difference comes in the charges. Jurors could acquit Wheelock of first-degree murder and two special circumstances or convict on voluntary manslaughter or second-degree murder, Ogul said, sparing his client the death penalty.

"This prosecution is wrong, just like we all are wrong when we try to judge a book by its cover," Ogul said.