The Johnstown native serving a life sentence for killing two Blair County residents in 2009 has taken his own life in prison.

Nicholas Horner, 39, died Saturday at SCI Albion, Erie County, where he was serving a life sentence without parole for opening fire 10 years ago in a Subway restaurant and in the street, killing two people and injuring another.

Erie County Chief Deputy Coroner Nick Rekitt said Monday that guards found an injured Horner while conducting routine checks of cell blocks.

Horner died from self-inflicted lacerations on his right arm, Rekitt said.

A press release from the prison said officers provided immediate emergency first aid until facility medical personnel arrived.

Horner was then transferred to the infirmary where life-sustaining measures continued to be performed until outside emergency personnel arrived.

He was pronounced dead at 2:33 a.m. Saturday.

Rekitt did not disclose what kind of instrument Horner cut himself with. He said Erie County State Police are still investigating.

Rekitt was adamant that Horner’s death was the result of suicide.

“There are no signs of foul play,” he said.

In 2009, Horner, then a 28-year-old Army veteran who had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from two deployments in the Iraq War, shot his way into the Subway restaurant on 58th Street, where he attempted to commit a robbery.

In opening fire at the restaurant’s back door, Horner killed 19-year-old Scott Thomas Garlick, a Hollidaysburg Area High School senior who was preparing for graduation and for college life.

In the restaurant, he also shot and wounded Michele Petty. He then fled into the Eldorado neighborhood of Altoona, where he shot Raymond Williams, 64, as he was standing at his mailbox.

Blair County Victim/Witness Program Coordinator Sue Griep contacted the families of Horner’s victims with Monday’s news. She said they preferred not to be contacted and declined comment.

Horner’s attorney, Tho­mas Dickey, recalled how remorseful Horner was for his actions.

Dickey represented Horner during his trial, which ended in March 2012.

“My thoughts and prayers go out to his family,” Dickey said Monday. “It’s also sad because he did cause the death of two people. My thoughts and prayers go out to their families because they continue to suffer.”

Dickey contended that Horner’s training to kill and his witnessing of trauma, including a bus explosion full of children, caused him to have flashbacks.

During the trial, the concept of PTSD was still relatively new, Dickey said.

“It was like the first time someone talked about germs — invisible bugs. People said ‘you’re crazy.’ PTSD was one of those theories people had trouble grasping,” he said.

The jury decided on a life sentence, but Dickey was confident that he could win an appeal to the state’s higher courts, which would allow him to present an insanity defense based on Horner’s PTSD, which the Blair County courts did not allow.

Dickey was assured by the fact that his petition to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which he filed before the trial, had delayed the jury selection significantly. The higher court allowed the lower court to proceed with the trial according to its rules, but it did not dismiss the insanity defense as the county did; it simply was not the right time for the higher court to make a judgment in the case until after a conviction.

“The fact that the Supreme Court stopped the jury selection for the trial was big,” Dickey said. “They didn’t dismiss the insanity defense. … The Supreme Court basically said ‘we won’t entertain it right now’ because the highest court won’t hear a case while it’s in a lower court. But we believed that an appeal at the Superior Court would have ruled in our favor.”

But Horner, a 1999 Conemaugh Valley High School graduate, chose not to appeal his life sentence in the state’s higher court despite Dickey’s confidence and formally asked Dickey, in writing, to withdraw the appeal.

“He did not want to put the victims’ families through another trial,” Dickey said. “It was commendable; he put his own legal interest second to the families. I already filed the appeal, but he instructed me to withdraw it.

He gave great credence and consideration to what the families went through. He was extremely remorseful. It was even difficult during trial. He felt terrible about what he did the whole time. He was just very remorseful and extremely sorry for what was done.”

Mirror Staff Writer Russ O’Reilly is at 814-946-7435.