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Thread: Thomas Edward Knuff, Jr. - Ohio Death Row

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    Thomas Edward Knuff, Jr. - Ohio Death Row


    Regina Capobianco and John Mann




    Edited:

    Prosecutors to seek death penalty in Parma Heights prison pen-pal double slaying

    By Cory Shaffer
    cleveland.com

    CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Cuyahoga County prosecutors will seek the death penalty against a 42-year-old man accused of stabbing to death his prison pen-pal and her boyfriend, then leaving their bodies in a Parma Heights home as he committed more crimes.

    Thomas Knuff Jr. was indicted on multiple charges including aggravated murder with capital specifications that will make him eligible for the death penalty if he is convicted in the May 11 slayings of John Mann, 65, and Regina Capobianco, 50, at Mann's home in the 6200 block of Nelwood Road, near Ackley Road.

    Knuff is also accused of soliciting two people, described as unindicted co-conspirators, to set fire to the bedroom where he left the couple's bodies, according to the indictment.

    Knuff, who is currently being held on a $50 million bond, is set for a July 25 arraignment in Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court.

    Capobianco met Knuff through a prison inmate-to-inmate pen-pal program and the two exchanged letters for about 10 years, Parma Heights Capt. Steve Scharschmidt said.

    Knuff was serving a 12-year sentence on multiple counts of aggravated robbery and breaking and entering charges.

    Capobianco and Mann picked up Knuff when he was released from the Lorain Correctional Institution on April 11 and took him back to Mann's home.

    Capobianco's sister reported her missing to Stark County authorities May 23, about 12 days after authorities believe the couple was killed.

    Police found their bodies on June 21 along with a knife at the scene, Scharschmidt said.

    Investigators obtained warrants to search Knuff's property, including his cellphone, and uncovered phone calls, text messages and letters that Knuff had written to an ex-girlfriend in the weeks after the killing, Scharschmidt said.

    Knuff asked the woman to buy kerosene and have another man set fire to the room where the bodies were found in exchange for $500, Scharschmidt said.

    They also tied Knuff to break-ins at Classic Hair Studio and Spa & Nails on May 17 and 18, according to the indictment.

    http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index...eath_pena.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Guards suspect fake badges, map, mask and blade part of Parma Heights double murder suspect's jailbreak plot

    By Cory Shaffer
    cleveland.com

    CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A jailed Parma Heights man accused of killing his former prison pen-pals had fake sheriff's badges, a printout of a map, spools of thread and a blade fashioned out of a lens from a pair of eyeglasses in a homemade fanny pack and inside of his cell, according to a report.

    The Saturday discovery led authorities to suspect that 42-year-old Thomas Knuff was planning to escape from the Cuyahoga County Jail where he's awaiting trial on charges that make him eligible for the death penalty if he is convicted.

    Knuff was ordered to undergo multiple strip searches and cell searches each day after the discovery, and must be shackled in a belly chain and handcuffs anytime he moves throughout the jail.

    The Cuyahoga County Sheriff's Department, which operates the jail, has opened an internal investigation into the incident, a spokeswoman said.

    One of Knuff's lawyers, Craig Weintraub, rejected the idea that Knuff was scheming a jailbreak with items that he said sounded like a "Halloween costume."

    "This is complete fiction that is pure fantasy from the imagination of someone at the Cuyahoga County Sheriff's Department," Weintraub said.

    He is currently being held on $50 million bond on charges including aggravated murder, conspiracy, offenses against a human corpse, aggravated burglary and robbery in the May 11 slayings of John Mann, 65, and Regina Capobianco, 50, at Mann's home in the 6200 block of Nelwood Road, near Ackley Road.

    http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index...ges_map_1.html

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    Trial in Parma Heights prison pen-pal killings begins with jury selection

    By Cory Shaffer
    cleveland.com

    CLEVELAND, Ohio -- Jury selection began Friday in the trial of a man accused of fatally stabbing his former prison pen-pals in their Parma Heights home in May 2017, then leaving their bodies behind as he carried out more crimes.

    Thomas Knuff, 44, faces the death penalty if a jury convicts him of the most serious charges.

    He is currently being held on $50 million bond on charges including aggravated murder, conspiracy, offenses against a human corpse, aggravated burglary and robbery in the May 11 slayings of John Mann, 65, and Regina Capobianco, 50, at Mann’s home in the 6200 block of Nelwood Road, near Ackley Road.

    Prosecutors say Knuff also solicited two people to set fire to the bedroom where he left the couple’s bodies, and broke into two businesses in the days after the killings.

    Capobianco met Knuff through a prison pen-pal program while Knuff was serving a 12-year sentence on aggravated robbery and breaking and entering charges. The two wrote letters to each other for about 10 years, police said.

    Police said that Capobianco and Mann picked up Knuff from the Lorain Correctional Institution when Knuff was released from prison on April 11, 2017. They took him back to Mann’s home.

    Capobianco’s sister reported her missing to Stark County authorities the next month, and investigators found Mann and Capobianco dead from the knife wounds on June 21, 2017.

    Knuff was also charged with escape after officials said they foiled a plot to escape from his jail cell within months of his arrest.

    Sheriff’s department employees reported in December that they found fake sheriff’s badges, a printout of a map, spools of thread and a blade fashioned out of a lens from a pair of eyeglasses and a homemade fanny pack inside of Knuff’s cell.

    One of Knuff’s lawyers, Craig Weintraub, disputed the seriousness of Knuff’s plans, and said the items more resembled a Halloween costume than tools of a legitimate jailbreak.

    https://www.cleveland.com/court-just...selection.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Parolee charged in slaying of ex-prison pen pal, friend in Parma Heights invoked ‘Dexter,’ wanted to dismember bodies, prosecutor says

    By Cory Shaffer
    cleveland.com

    CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A prosecutor told a jury that the 44-year-old man accused of stabbing to death his former prison pen pal and her friend planned to dismember their bodies in a manner similar to TV serial killer “Dexter."

    In the days after the May 11, 2017 killings in Parma Heights, Thomas Knuff Jr., asked a friend to buy him a table saw and told his son that he was worried what evidence police may find on the fingertips of the bodies of John Mann, 65, and Regina Capobianco, 50, the prosecutor said.

    “He didn’t want them to find their fingertips,” Assistant Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Anna Faraglia said. “'Just like in Dexter,' he told his son.”

    Knuff never made good on his plan to cut up the bodies, prosecutors said.

    Faraglia and defense attorney Craig Weintraub told jurors very similar accounts of the lead-up to the killings during their opening statements on Monday in the trial where Knuff is charged with aggregated murder and a slew of other charges. Knuff faces the death penalty if convicted of the most serious charges.

    Prosecutors revealed more details about the grisly killings that happened inside Mann’s house at the end of a cul-de-sac on Nelwood Road in Parma Heights.

    Pen-pals and paramours

    Knuff befriended Capobianco through an inmate-to-inmate pen-pal service while both were imprisoned in the late 2000s. Capobianco was sentenced to prison in 2009 after she pleaded guilty to felony drug possession charges and violated probation, and Knuff was serving a dozen years for aggravated robbery.

    At the same time, Knuff developed romantic feelings for Alicia Stoner, a social worker at Trumbull Correctional Institution where Knuff was locked, Faraglia said.

    Faraglia described Stoner as Knuff’s “prison paramour” throughout her opening statements. The social worker lost her job over her interactions with Knuff.

    Knuff qualified for parole in April 2017. Mann and Capobianco arranged to pick him up from prison, but their plans fell through. Knuff called Stoner who picked him up and drove him to Cincinnati.

    The two stayed there for several days. Knuff returned to the Cleveland-area because the terms of his probation required him to live in Cuyahoga County. Stoner paid for him to stay in several motels in the Cleveland area, Faraglia said.

    Knuff reconnected with Capobianco and Mann, and the two invited him to stay at Mann’s house in Parma Heights in early May 2017. Capobianco was on misdemeanor probation at the time, and Knuff was not allowed to live with anyone on probation as part of his parole, Faraglia said.

    Only one of the two could stay with Mann, and he chose Knuff over Capobianco. Stoner wired Knuff money so he could put up Capobianco in a hotel, but Capobianco protested because she had been around longer than Knuff.

    ‘He wanted to eradicate them’

    Prosecutors say that Knuff, who did not like the way Capobianco treated Mann and decided to get rid of her, “in cold blood and with prior calculation and design," stabbed both her and Mann several times in the home. Faraglia did not say why prosecutors believe Knuff also killed Mann if his goal was to simply remove Capobianco.

    Knuff rolled up the bodies in blankets, dragged them to their bedroom, and left the home, Faraglia said.

    He asked Stoner to buy him garbage bags, a new pair of shoes and a table saw, Faraglia said. He scrubbed blood from the home’s walls, cut out blood-soaked portions of the carpet, stuffed the pieces in garbage bags and tossed them in the hallway and in the basement, she said. He asked neighbors when the trash would come, she said.

    Then he sent Stoner a letter, asking her to hire a man to set fire to Mann’s house, Faraglia said.

    “He wanted to eradicate them,” Faraglia said. “He didn’t want them to ever be found.”

    Knuff stole a Jeep from his adult son and used it to break into two beauty stores and steal hundreds of dollars in cash, the prosecutor said.

    He drove down Interstate 71 to Medina County, where he pulled over onto the median, got out of the SUV and pretended to hold a gun to his head until someone called the State Highway Patrol, Faragalia said.

    Troopers took him into custody and took him to the hospital, where doctors amputated his nearly severed finger and gave him a psychological evaluation, she said. He was released, and stayed with a revolving cast of his childhood friends until his June 13, 2017 arrest.

    A gruesome discovery

    Residents back on Nelwood Road complained of a foul smell emanating from Mann’s house, Faraglia said. Police went to the house on May 23, 2017 and went inside. The officers found “a hoarder’s paradise,” Faraglia said. Garbage bags lined the halls and rooms, and rotten meat lay on the table. Police believed the smell was coming from the meat, disposed of it, and left without searching the rest house, she said.

    Capobianco’s sister grew concerned that she hadn’t heard from her sister and went to the house herself on June 21, 2017.

    The grass grew wild, weeks of mail piled on the front stoop and the air smelled rotten, Faraglia said. The sister went into the house through the backdoor, and noticed Capobianco’s heart medication on the piano.

    A neighbor noticed the woman go into the house and called police. Officers showed up and again went into the house, this time in hazmat suits, and a sergeant found Mann’s skull in the bedroom. He called the county’s medical examiner’s office, which also discovered Capobianco’s skull.

    Both of the bodies were decomposed to the point that fluid had leaked through the walls onto the outside of the house, which emitted the odor that neighbors smelled, Faraglia said.

    ‘Maybes and what-ifs'

    Weintraub in his opening statement declared the state’s entire case relied solely on circumstantial evidence.

    “There will be no evidence, other than speculation, whatsoever, that Thomas Knuff committed two aggravated murders,” Weintraub said. “It’s a case that is premised on maybes and what-ifs.”

    Weintraub argued that Knuff had no motive to kill either Capobianco or Mann, both of whom he cared deeply for. The motive belonged to Capobianco, Weintraub said.

    Knuff felt that Capobianco was taking advantage of Mann, and told Mann about an elder abuse hotline, Weintraub said. When Mann and Knuff tried to kick Capobianco out of the house, she attacked them, Weintraub said.

    Knuff told investigators that Capobianco killed Mann and he killed her in self-defense when he tried to intervene, prosecutors said. Toxicology reports will show Capobianco had been drinking and taking drugs that night, Weintraub said

    Knuff panicked after the killings, Weintraub said. He feared no one would believe his story of self-defense because he was on parole, and that he was surely headed to back to jail, Weintraub said. So he resorted to getting high and, in a drug-induced haze, broke into the stores to get some quick cash.

    He then lied to his son and others in his life about what happened, because he didn’t want them to get involved, Weintraub said.

    https://www.cleveland.com/court-just...utor-says.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Jury convicts Parma Heights parolee in pen-pal slayings; death penalty phase awaits

    By Cory Shaffer
    cleveland.com

    CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A Parma Heights parolee will face the death penalty after a jury on Thursday convicted him of killing a former prison pen-pal and the man she lived with in 2017, then trying to hire a man to burn the home where their bodies were eventually discovered.

    After a seven week trial, jurors deliberated for two days before they found Thomas Knuff guilty on more than 20 counts in the deaths of Regina Capobianco, 50, and John Mann, 65.

    Family members of the victims cried as Common Pleas Court Judge Deena Calabrese read the verdicts.

    The trial now moves to the penalty phase, where the same jury will hear additional evidence and decide whether to recommend a sentence of death or life in prison. That phase is set to begin July 22.

    Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael O’Malley said the verdict is a step toward delivering justice for the families of Capobianco and Mann.

    “The victims welcomed this defendant into their residence when he had no other place to stay, only to be repaid by being viciously attacked and murdered,” O’Malley said.

    Knuff befriended Capobianco through an inmate-to-inmate pen-pal program in the 2000s, and went to stay with the pair at the home they shared on Nelwood Road in Parma Heights. Knuff was released from prison on parole in April 2017 after serving 15 years for an aggravated robbery conviction.

    Capobianco’s felony record meant that both she and Knuff could not both stay in the same house, and prosecutors contended at trial that the two got into an argument after Mann chose Capobianco over Knuff. Knuff stabbed her to death and then killed Mann, prosecutors said.

    Capobianco was stabbed six times, and Mann was stabbed 15 times, a pathologist from the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office testified.

    Knuff covered up the crime by moving the bodies into the bedroom, wrapping them with blankets and covering them with garbage, prosecutors said. He also scrubbed the walls of blood spatter and removed pieces of carpet soaked with blood, prosecutors said.

    He took Mann’s car and left the bodies in the home where they decayed for more than a month.

    Capobianco’s relatives reported her missing in the days after the killing, but Parma Heights police officers never tried to enter the home. They interviewed Knuff, who lied and said he believed the two had gone to stay with friends in Canton, prosecutors said.

    Neighbors called police to report the smell, and officers entered the home and found raw meat that had been left on the kitchen table, prosecutors said. Officers assumed the smell came from the meat and disposed of it, then left the house without searching any of the other rooms.

    Police went back to the house on June 21, and a detective discovered Capobianco’s skull in the bedroom, prosecutors said. Authorities then found Mann’s body within minutes, and launched a homicide investigation.

    Knuff, whose finger was badly cut during the stabbings, told several different stories about how he cut his finger in the days that followed the killings, prosecutors said. He told his son that he fended off a group of drug dealers who had beaten up Mann and Capobianco, and he told his girlfriend, Alicia Stoner, that he cut himself in a bar fight.

    He went to an area hospital after the cut became infected, and his finger was amputated. He told the nurse there that he had cut his finger after stabbing two people, according to his medical records.

    Knuff eventually confided to Stoner that he had killed someone and needed to dispose of a body, and asked her to buy him power tools. He told her that he planned to cut them up like title character from the Showtime serial-killer series “Dexter” so police couldn’t find evidence on their fingertips, prosecutors said. He never made good on the plan.

    Stoner pleaded guilty to charges that accused her of helping Knuff to dispose of the bodies and was sentenced to probation.

    Knuff broke into two beauty stores and stole cash from the registers. He was arrested on June 13, 2017 in the break-ins, more than a week before police knew Mann and Capobianco were dead.

    Knuff escalated his cover-up scheme after his arrest and solicited Robert DeLugo to burn down the house.

    In a handwritten letter that prosecutors read during the trial, Knuff directed DeLugo, whom Knuff referred to as “Big Bro,” to burn down the house to dispose of the bodies. Knuff specifically told DeLugo to set fire in the bedroom, where “the most incriminating s--t” was, the letter read.

    He was referring to the decomposed bodies of Mann and Capobianco, prosecutors said.

    He also directed Stoner to pay DeLugo and give him flammable materials to carry out the arson.

    DeLugo did not carry out the crime and was never charged.

    After the discoveries, Knuff maintained to police that he acted in self-defense. His lawyers at trial said Knuff came back to the house on May 11 and found Capobianco stabbing Mann, and tried to stop the attack. He took the knife from her and tried to tend to Mann, but Capobianco grabbed another knife from the kitchen and attacked Knuff, cutting his finger, his lawyers said. Knuff then killed Capobianco in self-defense, his lawyers said.

    Knuff sought to cover his deeds because he feared he would go back to prison for a parole violation, even though he acted in self-defense, his lawyers said.

    https://www.cleveland.com/court-just...se-awaits.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    Jury recommends death sentence in Parma Heights prison pen-pal double-murders

    By Cory Shaffer
    cleveland.com

    CLEVELAND, Ohio – Jurors on Tuesday recommended that Thomas Knuff be executed for fatally stabbing his former prison pen-pal and the man she lived with, then trying to hire a man to set fire to the home that housed their decaying bodies.

    The same jury that last month convicted Knuff of charges including aggravated murder that made him eligible for the death penalty took about three hours to determine that he should pay the ultimate penalty for the April 2017 crime spree that left John Mann and Regina Capobianco dead.

    Common Pleas Court Judge Dena Calabrese, who presided over the six-week trial, will sentence Knuff in August. Calabrese can either accept the jury’s recommendation and impose a death sentence on Knuff, or sentence him to life in prison.

    Knuff befriended Capobianco through an inmate-to-inmate pen-pal program in the 2000s and moved in with her and Mann on Nelwood Road in Parma Heights in April 2017 when he was released on parole, after serving 15 years for an aggravated robbery conviction.

    Capobianco’s felony record meant that she and Knuff could not both stay in the same house, and prosecutors contended at trial that the two got into an argument after Mann chose to keep Capobianco in the house over Knuff. Knuff stabbed her to death and then killed Mann during the argument, prosecutors said.

    Capobianco was stabbed six times, and Mann was stabbed 15 times, a pathologist from the Cuyahoga County Medical Examiner’s Office testified.

    Knuff and his lawyers maintained that he acted in self-defense after he stumbled upon Capobianco stabbing Mann. Knuff took the knife from her and tried to tend to Mann, but Capobianco grabbed another knife from the kitchen and attacked Knuff, cutting his finger, his lawyers said. Knuff killed Capobianco in self-defense, and Mann died from the injuries inflicted by Capobianco, his lawyers said.

    Knuff sought to cover up the killings because he feared he would go back to prison for a parole violation, even though he acted in self-defense, his lawyers said.

    In the weeks that followed, Knuff came up with several different cover stories to explain his injury and why he needed a new place to stay, prosecutors say. He told his girlfriend, Alicia Stoner, that he cut his finger in a bar fight, and told his son that a group of black drug dealers broke into the house and attacked him, Mann and Capobianco. He went to a Medina County hospital when his finger became and infected, and told the nurse that he stabbed two people in self-defense, prosecutors said.

    Knuff eventually confided to Stoner that he had killed someone and needed to dispose of a body, and asked her to buy him power tools. He told her that he planned to cut them up like title character from the Showtime serial-killer series "Dexter" so police couldn’t find evidence on their fingertips, prosecutors said. He never made good on the plan.

    Stoner, a former prison social worker who met Knuff while he was locked up the in Trumbull County Correctional Facility, pleaded guilty last year to charges that accused her of helping Knuff to dispose of the bodies and was sentenced to probation.

    Knuff broke into two beauty stores and stole cash from the registers. He was arrested on June 13, 2017 in the break-ins, more than a week before police knew Mann and Capobianco were dead.

    Knuff escalated his cover-up scheme after his arrest. He wrote to Robert De Lugo from jail, asking him in great detail to burn down the house, starting in the bedroom with “the most incriminating s—t,” which prosecutors said was a reference to the decaying bodies of Mann and Capobianco. He also directed Stoner to pay De Lugo and buy materials to help start the fire, prosecutors said.

    De Lugo did not follow through with the plan.

    While all this occurred, Parma Heights police had still not found the bodies of Capobianco and Mann.

    Capobianco’s relatives reported her missing in the days after the killing, but Parma Heights police officers never tried to enter the home. They interviewed Knuff, who lied and said he believed the two had gone to stay with friends in Canton, prosecutors said.

    Neighbors called police weeks after the killings to report a smell of rotting meat emanating in the neighborhood, and officers entered the home and found raw meat that had been left on the kitchen table, prosecutors said. Officers assumed the smell came from the meat and disposed of it, then left the house without searching any of the other rooms.

    Police eventually went back into the house on June 21, and a detective discovered Capobianco’s skull buried under debris in the bedroom, prosecutors said. Authorities then found Mann’s body within minutes, and launched a homicide investigation.

    https://www.cleveland.com/court-just...e-murders.html
    "I realize this may sound harsh, but as a father and former lawman, I really don't care if it's by lethal injection, by the electric chair, firing squad, hanging, the guillotine or being fed to the lions."
    - Oklahoma Rep. Mike Christian

    "There are some people who just do not deserve to live,"
    - Rev. Richard Hawke

    “There are lots of extremely smug and self-satisfied people in what would be deemed lower down in society, who also deserve to be pulled up. In a proper free society, you should be allowed to make jokes about absolutely anything.”
    - Rowan Atkinson

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    ‘He wanted to eradicate them’

    Prosecutors say that Knuff, who did not like the way Capobianco treated Mann and decided to get rid of her, “in cold blood and with prior calculation and design," stabbed both her and Mann several times in the home. Faraglia did not say why prosecutors believe Knuff also killed Mann if his goal was to simply remove Capobianco.

    Knuff rolled up the bodies in blankets, dragged them to their bedroom, and left the home, Faraglia said.

    He asked Stoner to buy him garbage bags, a new pair of shoes and a table saw, Faraglia said. He scrubbed blood from the home’s walls, cut out blood-soaked portions of the carpet, stuffed the pieces in garbage bags and tossed them in the hallway and in the basement, she said. He asked neighbors when the trash would come, she said.
    this would be a problem for me, if i were on the jury. if you can't fully explain your theory when you're seeking the death penalty against someone, you shouldn't be seeking the death penalty, IMO, especially when this guy's claims of self-defense COULD be true (not saying they ARE true, I have no idea, but given the circumstances, it's plausible and the state should be able to prove otherwise in order to get a death sentence, but apparently, that wasn't needed with this jury).

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    Senior Member CnCP Addict one_two_bomb's Avatar
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    Good thing you werent on that jury!

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    ok, so you'd rather sentence someone to death even when what happened is not clear-cut and their explanation is plausible?

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    you're presuming that motives by murderers always make sense. but motives by people who aren't murderers don't always make sense.

    i used to teach at a supermax prison. many of my students were murderers. i remember one in specific who was in for the rest of his life because someone else carjacked someone and called the person who became my student and asked if he wanted to have some fun. fun consisted of coming over and torturing the guy to death.

    or there are all of those guys who kill their wife who is getting a divorce and she wants half of his property. is it really a better idea to kill your wife [when you are the main suspect] and spend the rest of your life in prison rather than 'losing' half your property?

    and i had students who were in prison because they didn't mind killing the person they killed, but they didn't want to kill a victim. i had students who said to me, 'i'm in prison for the rest of my life because i killed the guy who ripped me off, and because i didn't kill the person who was with him who hadn't done anything wrong.'

    what sense did the manson murders make?

    what sense do the murders where the adult bites a child all over the child's body make?

    it's asking too much to expect the DA to have to provide a coherent description of the murderers' motivations when the murderers themselves often cannot provide it.

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