HUNTSVILLE – A prosecutor on Wednesday compared an Athens attorney, who’s on trial for the kidnapping and sexual abuse of two underage girls, to a wolf in a silver sports car.

A defense attorney said the accusers were deceiving the jury every time their lips moved.

The 12-member jury will try to decide the case against John Hamilton McLain V, 50, when they resume deliberations at 9 a.m. today at the Madison County Courthouse.

McLain is charged with one count of enticing a child, two counts of second-degree kidnapping, two counts of second-degree sexual abuse and two counts of unlawful imprisonment.

He is accused of picking up the runaway Madison girls — ages 12 and 13 — from the side of U.S. 72 on July 3, driving them around Huntsville in his sports car, which had a tag that read “ZOOOMM,” up to Monte Sano Mountain, and then to his home in Athens, where he allegedly touched the breast of one of the girls, appeared nude before both of them and masturbated.

Tina Coker, one of three attorneys with the state Attorney General’s office prosecuting the case, said during her closing argument that McLain is a sexual predator.

“If you ever wondered what the face of a sexual predator looks like, here sits one,” she said, stepping over and pointing to McLain as he sat at the defense table.

McLain shook his head “no.”

The case went to the 10-man, two-woman jury about 1 p.m. Wednesday following some fiery closing arguments from prosecutors and a defense attorney.

Coker said that when McLain saw the two girls, a light went on in his head.

“He eased up to these little baby lambs (in his convertible) and took them home with him,” she said.

She seized on a statement McLain made to Athens Police that he “treated the girls like he would treat his own daughters.”

“If that were true, he would have called the police,” Coker said. “He would have gotten help, not drive them around. He kept them for lascivious reasons, to touch them, to talk to them, to bait them.”

She pointed out that the 13-year-old had testified that McLain gave the girls a tour of his home and, upon showing them the master bathroom, pointed to the shower and said it was big enough for three. The 13-year-old also testified that McLain told the girls they could sleep in his bed.

“Come get in the bed with me,” Coker said to the jury, first as a statement.

She repeated the phrase twice more as a question.

“Come get in the bed with me?” she asked loudly.

“Come get in the bed with me?” she asked even louder.

Defense attorneys Dan Totten and Marc Sandlin told jurors to question why the girls gave different versions of their stories to their parents and then to Madison Police. These first two accounts made no mention, Totten said, of McLain masturbating, of intimidation or of any fear of McLain. The girls initially told their parents they spent the night at a car lot on University Drive.

Sandlin said the girls did not reveal these points until their interviews with Athens Police Detective Sgt. Dustin Lansford.

Twice Totten said to jurors: “If their lips were moving it’s a good chance they were being deceptive.”

He said the jury should question the stories of the girls because they repeatedly said they could not remember why they ran away, which he suggested was unbelievable.

Sandlin said the girls added the details about masturbation, intimidation and fear to avoid long-term punishment from their parents. He said they feared that otherwise there would be no cell phones, computers, cars or dates in their futures.

Coker said the story unfolded slowly because the girls were uncomfortable with the subject.

Totten also said that prosecutors brought the incorrect charges against McLain. He told jurors that if they believe testimony that McLain touched the breast of the 12-year-old and then poked it again and said, “Oh, what’s that?” then the offense would be sexual abuse not enticement, which can carry up to a 20-year sentence.

Sandlin told jurors that if they believe McLain restrained the girls in any way, then they should find him guilty of unlawful imprisonment not kidnapping, which carries up to a 20-year sentence.

He said if a juror believes a witness is lying about one point in his or her testimony, the juror can disregard all of the testimony of that witness. He said this is part of the jury instructions.

Both defense attorneys said the girls either were not afraid of McLain or wanted to ride around with him and go to his home because they had cellular telephones upon which they could have called for help. They also pointed out during testimony Monday and Tuesday that the girls were alone in a gas station briefly and could have told the clerk or they could have used McLain’s home phone to call for help once he fell asleep.

One girl testified that her phone battery was dead and the other girl testified that she was too scared to call.

Coker said it was illegal for McLain to pick up the children, drive them around and take them to his house without the permission of their parents, which he did not have.

She also told jurors that the girls could not legally consent to sexual contact, “even if they begged him to.”

Coker said McLain masturbated in front of the girls as they sat on the living room couch where they had slept in order to entice the girls.

“He proposed that they get involved in his masturbation … come her and watch,” she said.

She said he intimidated the girls when, upon driving them about Huntsville, showed them the gun between his legs but told them not to worry, it was only for his protection.

Coker has also pointed out that McLain, if he was really worried about the girls wandering a busy highway at midnight in a large city, he could have — and should have — called police or parents or some other person to help.

In his rebuttal to the defense’s summation, lead prosecutor Don Valeska at one point resorted to name calling, referring to McLain as “Mr. Nude. Mr. Vile, disgusting, sex pervert.”

At first, he blasted the defense for saying he should not have added the kidnapping, unlawful imprisonment and sexual-abuse charges when the Athens Police investigator who best knew the case, had charged McLain only with two counts of enticing a child.

“Oh, let’s give him back the ZOOM car so he can go trolling again in your neighborhood,” Valeska said.

He asked jurors to reflect on the testimony of the 12-year-old’s father, who became emotional when he told the jury how he felt the night his daughter was missing and neighbors, family members and law-enforcement officers were looking for them.

“It was the worst night of my life,” the father said.

Valeska, his voice raised, told jurors, “It would be the worst night of your life if Mr. Zoom was squiring your 12-year-old around town.”

Finally, he said, “Do not let this predator out of this courtroom.”