PITTSBURGH (KDKA) — A judge has denied convicted killer Richard Baumhammers’ request for a new trial.

Baumhammers currently sits on death row for a shooting rampage that killed five people on April 28, 2000.

A decade ago, a jury handed down five death sentences for the murders of Anita Gordon, Thao Pham, Ji-Ye Sun, Anil Thakur, and Garry Lee. A sixth victim who was paralyzed in the shooting rampage, Sandip Patel, died seven years later.

Over the last few days, defense attorneys have been seeking either a new trial for Baumhammers or to have his death sentence thrown out — claiming that he had ineffective council at this original trial.

Today in court, his original attorney, Bill Difenderfer, disputed that claim — saying he called more than enough expert witnesses to testify in Baumhammers’ defense.

“As I even sit here now and I read all of their reports and what people testified to, I really don’t think I’d have done anything differently — and that’s the bottom line,” Difenderfer told KDKA-TV.

“I believe we called five or six psychiatrists — one from Atlanta, his treating psychiatrist here,” Difenderfer added. “His entire history, everything we’d come through our client’s life — from the day he was born until the trial, anything of substance that would be consistent with our defense, the jury heard.”

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