SHALIMAR - Deputies found Jeffrey Hutchinson on the floor of his garage "as if unconscious," steeped in the blood and tissue of his shotgunned victims, a prosecutor told the quadruple-murder suspect's jury Tuesday.

But that's only the government's side of the story, Hutchinson's lawyer told the 12 jurors, selected after two days of a tedious process.

In an opening statement that lasted about two minutes, defense lawyer Stephen Cobb said the government "jumped to a conclusion of guilt before the evidence and facts were handled in a proper and professional manner."

He also said "crucial evidence was ignored. Crucial evidence was mishandled."

Prosecutor Bobby Elmore gave a far different - and far more disturbing - opening statement, as he described the slaughter of Renee Flaherty, 32, and her three children.

Flaherty's family members, meanwhile, sat through the sometimes gruesome description of the murders, steeling themselves for the inevitable graphic testimony and pictures to come over the next two weeks.

Elmore is seeking the death penalty if Hutchinson, 38, an ex-Army Ranger from Deer Park, Wash., is convicted. He is charged with four counts of first-degree murder in the Sept. 11, 1998, deaths of Flaherty and her children. They were killed in the home, at 410 John King Road near Crestview, that they shared with Hutchinson.

For security purposes, a remote-controlled shock device was attached to the defendant's arm. Placed under his suit coat, it was not visible to jurors.

Though Hutchinson has made occasional outbursts during past court proceedings, a security official had no cause to trigger it Tuesday. All through Elmore's opening statement, Hutchinson stared ahead with a somber expression.

Hutchinson would be shocked, Judge G. Robert Barron said, only if "he becomes dangerous, unruly or excessively disruptive during the proceedings."

Elmore told the jury that the murders were preceded by an argument between Hutchinson and Flaherty.

Hutchinson then loaded his pickup truck with his clothing and weapons, including a high-powered rifle, two 9 mm pistols and a pistol-gripped shotgun.

He then went to the AMVETS bar in Crestview, where a bartender heard him say Flaherty was upset.

Meanwhile, Flaherty, "in tears," called a friend in Washington. She said Hutchinson had packed up and she did not think he was coming back.

"Unfortunately, he did," Elmore told the jury. "He got in his white Dodge pickup, roared out of the parking lot, spun his tires and zoomed across the road."

While driving back to the house, several people, including a motorist Hutchinson almost struck, saw Hutchinson's erratic driving, Elmore said. So did a Niceville police officer driving home, the prosecutor said, who "heard his tires screaming and squalling" as Hutchinson turned into the home's driveway.

That was when Hutchinson kicked in the dead-bolted front door of the house, burst in and proceeded to the master bedroom. There he found Renee Flaherty, her son Logan, 4, and daughter Amanda, 7.

One by one, Elmore said, Hutchinson shot his victims in their faces with a shotgun. The shots splattered their blood over the walls, ceiling, bed and master bathroom, he said.

Hutchinson then turned to Geoffrey Flaherty and fired at him through the bedroom doorway, sending a lead slug through the 9-year-old boy's chest. The slug hit a dining room table leg, collapsing the table.

Geoffrey, Elmore said, with no chance to live at that point, "tried to run away, and torrents of his blood were on the floor. He made it to the couch and fell to his hands and knees. With the last slug, he blew out Geoffrey Flaherty's head and finished him off.

"Every shot counted; every shot was fatal," Elmore told the jury.

Hutchinson then placed his shotgun on a counter, and "overcome with guilt, dialed 911 from a portable phone."

Deputies found that phone in his hand, still open to the 911 call, from which an operator heard Hutchinson say, "I just shot my family," according to Elmore.

Hutchinson was too drunk to give his name to the operators, Elmore said, but an audiotape of the 911 call will make it "completely obvious that it was Jeffrey Hutchinson," as will testimony from two people who know him.

But Hutchinson was not so drunk "that he couldn't form a premeditated intent to kill four people with five shots," Elmore told jurors.

State lab technicians have determined it was Geoffrey Flaherty's blood and tissue found on Hutchinson, he said, that the ejected shotgun shells were fired by the defendant's shotgun, and that gunpowder residue was found on his hands.

Flaherty's mother and brother, Melva Elmore and Wes Elmore, both of the Tacoma, Wash., area, said the state attorney's office prepared them Monday, making graphic photos available to them.

"We had been advised by our support group not to look at those pictures, but if we don't, or stay out of the courtroom, we might as well have stayed in Washington," Melva Elmore said. "We came here to be for Renee, not to stay out of the courtroom."

If they hadn't already seen the grisly photos, she said, "We would have been more shocked by the opening statement."

She and Wes Elmore said they were favorably impressed by the prosecutor's half-hour opening statement.

"No matter how graphic and hard it is on the family, we need to go through this," Wesley Elmore said. "We need to get this over with."

"There's not a bit of justice that can bring my sister back," he said. "It was tough waiting around for the jury today, but now it won't be so long and drawn out."

Testimony will begin at 8:30 this morning in Courtroom D at the Shalimar courthouse annex.