During their second day of deliberations, the jury requested to see an exhibit of a map surrounding the area where Cherica Adams, the former Carolina Panther's pregnant girlfriend, was gunned down in a drive-by shooting.

The map features photographs of Adams' car, the movie theater where she and Carruth went on a date shortly before the Nov. 16, 1999, shooting, and Carruth's house.

While examining the exhibit, jurors had a brief discussion of the case while still in the courtroom, giving spectators a peek into their deliberations. Although their voices were barely audible, some of the jurors were pointing photographs out to the rest of the panel, perhaps providing a hint as to who the leaders on the jury are.

Among the jurors seemingly leading the discussion were the jury foreman (Juror No. 5) who is a white male in his 60s who works for a crisis assistance ministry; Jurors No. 1, 3 and 12, all black females, also were animated during the discussion.

Deliberations in the capital murder case began around noon Tuesday, when the panel picked a foreman before breaking for lunch and then reconvened at 2 p.m. The panel spent Tuesday morning listening to the state's rebuttal closing argument, in which prosecutor Gentry Caudill asked them once again to convict the ex-Carolina Panther.

Charging that Rae Carruth is even more evil than his co-defendants, Caudill asked jurors to convict the ex-pro football player of murdering his pregnant girlfriend, Cherica Adams.

"I ask you to hold him responsible for what he did — to hold him responsible for what Cherica saw," Caudill said.

Adams said in a call to 911 and in pages of notes she had written that Carruth's car was in front of hers when another car pulled up beside her and someone in it opened fire. Seven months pregnant with Carruth's baby at the time of the shooting, Adams said the former football player fled the scene after the shooting. Though shot four times, she managed to deliver Carruth's second child, Chancellor, but she died nearly a month later.

In a nearly two-hour rebuttal Tuesday morning, Caudill tried to knock down points made Monday afternoon by defense attorney David Rudolf in his lengthy closing argument.

Though Rudolf gave the jury a list of reasonable doubts they could use to acquit Carruth of Adams' murder, Caudill said that the prosecution proved beyond a reasonable doubt that Carruth was the mastermind behind a contract killing carried out by triggerman Van Brett Watkins, wheelman Michael Kennedy and another co-defendant, Stanley Abraham, who Caudill said disposed of evidence after the crime.

"I'll tell you about evil. To those three, Cherica Adams was just a face, just a mark," Caudill said of Watkins, Kennedy and Abraham. "But to that man, Rae Carruth, she was carrying his flesh and blood and he intended for that child to never come into this world."

Caudill offered two ways the jury could convict Carruth. The first is first-degree murder by premeditation and deliberation — which he said is commonly known as "cold-blooded murder."

"You don't get much cooler than this defendant right here," Caudill said, gesturing toward Carruth.

The second option is felony murder, which applies when someone is killed in the commission of another serious crime. Though commonly used in murder cases involving robbery or rape, the underlying felony in this case is shooting into an occupied vehicle.

Rudolf had argued to throw out that charge, claiming that shooting into Adams' car was the very action that caused her death and was not an underlying felony. Judge Charles Lamm, however, rejected that argument.

The jury also heard about the two types of murder from Judge Lamm when he later gave the panel of seven men and five women instructions.

Judge Charles Lamm charges the jury

Before Caudill had finished his rebuttal, however, he made a final attempt to deflect shots the defense took at the credibility of some state witnesses.

Among the witnesses the prosecutor defended was Amber Turner, Carruth's ex-girlfriend who testified that the former football player threatened to kill her if she didn't abort his child. Rudolf painted her as a bitter woman who lied because she was angry Carruth didn't want to be with her.

"A woman scorned? Hell hath no fury? Is that the concept here?" Caudill said. "She has been nothing but the best friend this man ever had. What has she ever done to this man but be good to him?"

Caudill also offered the jury an explanation for the testimony of Barbara Turner, Amber's mother, implying that she's in denial about Carruth. Barbara Turner testified for the defense that she never knew of her daughter's abortion and was even seen mouthing the words "I love you" to Carruth as she left the courtroom.

"It's hard to admit to yourself that you let your daughter go off to live with a man in another city, a man that could be capable of this," he said.

Amber Turner wasn't the only person to see a different side of Carruth, according to Caudill. While Turner saw this side gradually, the prosecutor said that Cherica Adams saw it too late, and another ex-girlfriend, Candace Smith, saw it "very suddenly" after Carruth allegedly confessed to her his involvement in the shooting.