Opening arguments before jurors who will decide the fate of Carl Brandon could come as early as today in Hattiesburg.

Selection of the panel to hear the murder, aggravated assault and shooting into an occupied dwelling indictments Brandon faces began this morning at Port Gibson High School.

Brandon, 52, a former Claiborne County department head, is not expected to deny killing the attorney for the county’s board of supervisors, wounding a county employee or firing into the home of the county’s former administrator, but is expected to plead he was insane at the time.

Circuit Judge Frank Vollor of Vicksburg is presiding in the case on appointment by the state Supreme Court after Claiborne County Circuit Judge Lamar Pickard recused himself.

Initially, it was expected that separate trials on the charges might be scheduled, but Vollor ruled Friday to consolidate all counts and begin jury selection today.

After a panel is chosen, members and alternates will be bused to Hattiesburg for the trial.

No change of venue motion was granted in the case. Beverly Pettigrew Kraft of the administrative office of courts said the numbers involved were behind the change from what would have been normal, jury selection and trial in the Claiborne County Courthouse.

&#8220It was moved for a bigger facility,” she said. &#8220That courtroom is very small, and Judge Vollor thought the trial needed to be moved to a bigger place.”

Selected was a Masonic Temple in Hattiesburg near the Forrest County Circuit Courthouse.

The charges say Brandon waited in ambush on Main Street in Port Gibson about 8 a.m. on March 17, 2006, for board attorney Allen Burrell, who was killed with a shotgun as he stepped out of his vehicle.

Brandon is accused of driving then to Claiborne County Administrator James Miller’s home, which was pelted with shotgun blasts. Miller was inside, but was not hit.

The next stop was the Claiborne County Highway Department building on Mississippi 18, in which Loretha Porter was shot and wounded at her desk.

Brandon turned himself in at the Claiborne County Sheriff’s Department minutes later. During legal preliminaries, he accused the county officials of making him do what he had done.

Although working as a special populations teacher at Vicksburg High School at the time, Brandon had been pursuing a wrongful discharge case since being fired in 1997. He eventually lost his case before the Supreme Court in 2002 and had attended a meeting of the county board the night before.

Brandon had been road foreman for the 12,000-person county and was terminated after being accused of sexually harassing a female co-worker. He consistently denied the accusation, saying it was a pretext for a firing based on politics.

He is represented by Canton attorney Edward Blackmon and results of mental exams administered by prosecution and defense expertes were expected to become evidence for jurors to weigh. In Mississippi, a finding of innocent due to insanity must be based on jurors concluding a defendant was incapable of discerning right and wrong at the time of a criminal act.

Killing due to uncontrollable rage is manslaughter, which has a 20-year maximum sentence. Killing after premeditation is murder which requires a sentence of life in prison without parole.

Kraft said that initially more than 700 potential jurors had been summoned when it was thought there would be two trials. The names of 350 Claiborne voters were selected at random to form the jury pool today.

Burrell, who was 54, had represented the county’s supervisors for 26 years, and Miller participated in the investigation that led to Brandon’s firing. Porter was employed by the road department and provided information in the investigation, Claiborne County Sheriff Frank Davis has said. After being shot, she was taken to University Medical Center where treatment of handgun wounds in her back and side lasted five days.

Burrell had practiced law in Port Gibson for 30 years. He was on the professional responsibility committee of the state bar association, which honored him posthumously with its distinguished service award.