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Classmate: Teen showed a gun days before shooting

A picture of the surveillance tape shows Brazill pointing a gun at another teacher after fatally shooting Barry Grunow in May 2000.

WEST PALM BEACH, Florida (CNN) -- A fellow student testified Friday that 14-year-old Nathaniel Brazill showed her a gun three days before he fatally shot his teacher, giving apparent support to prosecutors who say the killing outside a school classroom last year was intentional.

Another student who witnessed the shooting, which occurred on the last day of school at Lake Worth Community Middle School, said Brazill was "standing cool, like a normal person would stand."

But Timothy Gandolfo also said Brazill had a "surprised-scared face," as if he were in shock. "His eyes were bulging out," Gandolfo said.

VIDEO CNN's Mark Potter reports on the alleged shooting captured on this security video taken at a Florida school Play video (QuickTime, Real or Windows Media) CNN's Mark Potter has more on the first degree murder trial of Nathaniel Brazil in West Palm Beach, Florida (May 2) Play video (QuickTime, Real or Windows Media)  DOCUMENT • Read the Florida law on juveniles being tried as adults  MESSAGE BOARD School safety

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Brazill, who was 13 at the time, is charged with first-degree murder for shooting teacher Barry Grunow. He could be sentenced to life in prison if convicted. Lake Worth is the city immediately south of West Palm Beach.

Defense attorneys argue Brazill fired the gun accidentally. They say he wanted to talk to a girl inside Grunow's classroom and when Grunow refused to let him enter, Brazill pointed the gun only to show he was serious.

"This was his last chance to see her," said defense attorney Robert Udell. "It goes to the defense that he was so in love with her -- so much that he wanted to see her -- that he'd do something so stupid as what he did, pointing a gun at a teacher. It supports exactly what he's saying."

"There was never a premeditated intent to kill Mr. Grunow," defense attorney Lance Richard said in his opening statement. "There was never even a plan to even harm Mr. Grunow. Nathaniel Brazill admired Mr. Grunow. He loved him as a teacher. Mr. Grunow was one of his favorites."

Assistant State Attorney Marc Shiner told the jury of nine women and three men in his opening statement that Brazill was angry the day of the shooting because he had been sent home for misbehaving and had recently received a failing grade.

Police said Brazill returned with a .25-caliber handgun that belonged to his grandfather.

"This young man had more than one motive to kill Mr. Grunow," Shiner said. "You're going to see in this trial that this young man had a storm brewing within himself."

Classmate Tiffany Jenkins testified Friday that Brazill bragged three days before the shooting about having a gun. When she challenged him to prove it, he partially pulled the gun from his pocket and revealed the handle and three bullets, Jenkins said.

When she asked Brazill whether he would ever use the gun to kill someone, she said he replied, "No, not unless I have to."

Classmate Tam Mangolo testified Friday about the scene when Brazill came to the classroom door. "I do remember Mr. Grunow say, 'Don't point that,' in a very serious-voice tone," she said.

When Grunow began to close the door and pushed back students in the class who had come toward the door, Mangolo said, Brazill shot him in the face. Grunow, the married father of two children, crumpled to the floor.

Friday's testimony came a day after a forensic video expert showed jurors a school surveillance video of the shooting.

The video, from a school surveillance system, shows students walking in a hallway as a person in the distance appears to point towards an adult standing in a doorway. The figure in the doorway appears to fall to the ground and then the other person runs away, pointing what appears to be a weapon at another adult.

The exchange lasted about 20 seconds.

Several witnesses have testified they saw Brazill shoot Grunow or saw him running from the scene carrying a handgun.

A friend of Brazill's testified Thursday that just hours before the shooting Brazill asked him if he had a gun.

Brandon Spann said that when he asked why Brazill wanted it, Brazill said he was "going to f---k up the school."

Later Friday or on Monday, prosecutors plan to show the jury a videotaped statement Brazill gave police shortly after his arrest. The confession, released publicly last summer, gives Brazill's account of what happened when he told Grunow he wanted to talk to girls inside the room.

"I asked him if I could speak to them. He told me -- he told me no, he pushed me away and told me to go to class, and he had a smile on his face and he was laughing, and that really made me mad," Brazill says in the tape.

"OK, so what did you do then?" asks the detective.

"I don't really remember," Brazill replies.

"OK."

"I think I pulled out the gun. I was, like, shaking a lot. I could hardly hold the gun. And I was afraid to drop -- drop it, 'cause I didn't know what was gonna happen if I would have dropped it. And so it all just went from there," Brazill says.

The defense plans to call Brazill to testify sometime next week, the lawyers calling him their best witness.

Jury in teen's trial sees videotape of shooting
May 3, 2001
Friend says she saw teen-ager pull trigger
May 2, 2001
Florida teen offered plea in teacher shooting
April 17, 2001
Grand jury weighs charging 13-year-old as adult in teacher shooting
June 12, 2000

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