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Thread: Cody Alan Reece Sentenced to Life in 2010 UT Slaying of Magda Aleman

  1. #1
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    Cody Alan Reece Sentenced to Life in 2010 UT Slaying of Magda Aleman

    A jury will decide the fate of a man accused of murdering a Sandy mother while robbing her home.

    Attorneys will present their closing arguments this morning in the murder trial of Cody Alan Reece. He is charged with aggravated murder in the shooting of Magda Aleman on July 13, 2010. Investigators say she was a victim of a burglary gone bad, and that she had defensive wounds as if she tried to fight off her attacker.

    On the day of the murder, Aleman's husband returned to their Sandy home to find his wife dead on the couch with a gunshot wound to the head.

    The same day, Cody Allen Reece was arrested in connection with a burglary at a home in the same neighborhood.

    Homeowner Julene Back, said at the time, "He was out of control. He was yelling. I could never understand a word he was saying. I described it to my friends at work - he was like a wild animal."

    Her brother, Eric Sharp, was in the home with her. He said, "I looked around the corner and he whacked me in the right side of my face. Then he got me in my ribs, started hitting and kicking me."

    Back says she somehow persuaded Reece to leave her home. That's when neighbors, hearing screams, came over to help. They followed Reece to the next block and then held him until police got there.

    "It is very weird to think that maybe he just killed someone shortly before coming to my house," Back said. "It makes me want to know why. Why my house?"

    After the arrest, detectives took his T-shirt for evidence. Investigators sent it to the state crime lab for DNA testing and it came back positive for Aleman's blood.

    According to charging documents, Reece admitted to police that he washed her blood off of his hands and got rid of the gun used to kill her.

    Aleman left behind a husband and three children who were 9, 7 and 3 at the time of her murder.

    If Reece is found guilty of her murder, he could face the death penalty.

    http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=21290962
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  2. #2
    Jan
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    Man found guilty of aggravated burglary, homicide

    WEST JORDAN — Among the issues of guilt, innocence, motive and evidence, one element of the case against Cody Alan Reece was undisputed:

    Magda Aleman, a 33-year-old housewife and mother of three, was brutally shot and killed in her Sandy home on July 13, 2010.

    "Her life was sadly and senselessly cut short while she was at home in the seeming sanctity, security and safety of her own home," prosecutor Rob Neill told the jury. "Today is a day of reckoning for a brutal and meaningless crime."

    Jurors agreed and found Reece, 32, guilty of aggravated murder and aggravated burglary, first-degree felonies, and possession of a firearm by a restricted person and obstruction of justice, second-degree felonies, in connection with Aleman's death. The jury's verdict came after four hours of deliberation Tuesday.

    Aleman was found lying face down on a couch in her home at 11436 Tiger Tail Circle (1100 East) by her husband, Israel, when he returned from work. Her three children, then ages 9, 7 and 3, were at the home of a neighbor.

    Reece, 32, was charged with aggravated murder and aggravated burglary, first-degree felonies, and possession of a firearm by a restricted person and obstruction of justice, second-degree felonies, in connection with Aleman's death.

    Before the jury left 3rd District Judge Bruce Lubeck's courtroom to deliberate at 12:23 p.m., they heard two very different stories about the role Reece played in her death. Prosecutors say she was murdered in her own home after she startled him during a burglary. The defense says Reece went into the woman's home in an apparent drug-induced curiosity after hearing a gunshot.

    Closing argument from the prosecution

    Neill said Reece was near Aleman's home committing a string of thefts when he entered her home through an open garage to burglarize it.

    Reece didn't expect to find Aleman, who was known as someone who could hold her own, Neill said. He assaulted her and shot her in the head. He reminded jurors that Aleman's blood was found on Reece's shirt, and that he was arrested in the neighborhood shortly after the killing.

    Neill pointed to multiple conversations Reece had from jail in which he told his mother he could get the death penalty if he wasn't bailed out of jail, but didn't explain why. He added that Reece never talked about being wrongly accused.

    Neill became emotional as he asked the jury to convict Reece on all charges.

    "She was a mother, a wife, a sister, a daughter and a friend — a beloved friend," he said. "Today is the day of reckoning to hold the man who murdered her responsible."

    Closing arguments from defense

    Defense attorney Lisa Remal said Reece was sleep-deprived and under the influence of alcohol, prescription drugs and methamphetamine that day. She said those factors made him act differently than the normal person would, explaining her client's testimony that he only entered Aleman's house after hearing a gunshot and then saw the woman lying on the ground.

    "His first thought was that she must have shot herself, because that's what he saw, a single person lying there," Remal said, adding that Reece's memory of that day comes only in "snatches." "The next thing he remembers is being there and she was lying down."

    She told jurors that Reece remembered having something wet on his hands, Aleman's blood, and wiping his hands on his shirt.

    Next, Remal said Reece saw a Hispanic man with tattoos that led Reece to believe he was a gang member. She said this prompted Reece's next actions, which included breaking into another home in the area.

    "We would all be out that door because we all have that instinct to protect ourselves," Remal said, adding that if Reece was guilty he'd have left the area altogether. "You wouldn't want to draw attention to yourself, because you just killed somebody. But if you were completely freaked out and trying to hide from someone with a gun ... Cody reacted instead of thought."

    Reece will be sentenced Sept. 10.

    http://www.ksl.com/?nid=148&sid=21290962

  3. #3
    Jan
    Guest
    By Aaron Falk | The Salt Lake Tribune
    First Published Sep 10 2012

    Reece, killer of Utah mom, gets life without parole

    A Utah man convicted of killing a Sandy mother in her own home two years ago again proclaimed his innocence Monday, as a judge sentenced him to life in prison without parole.

    Cody Alan Reece said the family of 33-year-old Magda Aleman would find no comfort or closure in his imprisonment.

    "I’m not the killer," Reece said.

    In July, a 3rd District Court jury convicted Reece of killing Aleman, the wife of a Mexican restaurant chain owner and mother of three, on July 13, 2010. Israel Aleman-Gomes, who owns about a dozen Rancherito’s restaurants around the Salt Lake Valley, came home to find his wife covered in blood, dead on a love seat.

    Prosecutors say Reece broke into the home, beat the woman with the butt of a handgun and shot her in the forehead at point-blank range.

    But at trial, Reece and his defense attorneys said he was a heavy drug user and the victim of unfortunate circumstances. Reece, who had been drinking heavily and using drugs for days before the slaying, said he was in Aleman’s neighborhood looking for mail to steal when he came upon the woman’s home. He said he heard a gunshot, looked in Aleman’s back window and saw the woman dead from what he believed was a suicide.

    Reece said he does not remember what happened but that he found himself inside the home, standing over Aleman’s body and noticed he had something on his hand — apparently Aleman’s blood — which he wiped on his shirt. That’s when Reece said he saw a man with a gun. Reece ran from the house, jumped in his car and sped away through Sandy, causing a car crash and then entering several more homes.

    As prosecutor Peter Leavitt held up a crime scene photo of an "absolutely atrocious and brutal" murder, Reece interrupted.

    "How many times is he going to go over this s---?" the defendant said.

    Following another outburst, officers removed Reece from the courtroom, after he struggled with three men who slammed him against a door.

    http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/news/54...woman.html.csp

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