If Convicted, Millionaire Could Be First N.H. Execution Since 1939
Man once touted as a possible governor now a candidate for the death penalty.
Sept. 23, 2008 — -- John "Jay" Brooks is many things. He's a multimillionaire, for one. And he's a highly regarded entrepreneur whose success got him invited to a White House summit on small businesses. Power brokers in his home state of New Hampshire even started talking about Brooks as a potential candidate for governor.
Prosecutors, however, contend that Brooks is also a man who harbored a two-year grudge against a small-time trash hauler he suspected of stealing a van packed with his belongings that included his father's ashes.
That grudge was settled, according to court papers, when a reported Brooks accomplice lured the hauler name Jack Reid into a barn and into the lethal clutches of Brooks and another man who claimed he was supposed to be paid to kill Reid. Reid was beaten to death.
New Hampshire prosecutor Kirsten Wilson called the crime during opening arguments on Sept. 8 "a heinous and deliberate murder of an unsuspecting man, who financially had nothing, by a man that -- by outward appearances at least -- had it all."
Brooks, a multimillionaire who was named New Hampshire's "Small Business Person of the Year" in 1997, is now hoping to avoid conviction -- and the death penalty. It would be New Hampshire's first execution since 1939.
Brooks, 56, typified the all-American success story. He spent his teenage years working in a Manchester mill making cotton gauze. He enlisted in the military and spent time as a Navy medic. He later attended the University of New Hampshire where he met his wife, Lorraine.
His financial success was built while he worked at a private orthotics company during the day, and while at home at night he designed an innovative sterilization tray for surgical instruments. That invention led to the creation of his company, PolyVac.
The success of PolyVac led to a glowing 1994 profile of Brooks in the New Hampshire Business Review that pegged PolyVac's booming business at roughly $20 million a year.
The rapid growth of PolyVac caught the eye of New Hampshire business leaders. Brooks was nominated to the board of directors of the Business and Industry Association of New Hampshire. And in 1995, Brooks was named as a delegate to a White House small business summit. He later sold his company for millions and moved to Las Vegas.
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