You're Sam's criminal defense attorney--DEFEND HIM

Put on your defense here. You defend Sam in this case, lets here your defense strategy. I will share mine later.


OR if youd rather, PROSECUTE HIM. Your pick.

Motion to change venue

Motion to suppress the "Jesus made me do it" statement

Motion to suppress Sam's music

Let the DA know I want to negotiate a plea deal to get the death penalty off the table.

Initially plea insanity.

Attack mens rea requirements.

AndresEscobar wrote:Motion to change venue

Motion to suppress the "Jesus made me do it" statement

Motion to suppress Sam's music

Let the DA know I want to negotiate a plea deal to get the death penalty off the table.

Initially plea insanity.

Attack mens rea requirements.

I like that, thats a sound strategy IMO. Let me see what I can put together, looking over the warrants now to recheck evidence.

I am trying really hard to develop a reasonable doubt strategy but not coming up with anything, I think your plan is about the best that can be done from a defense standpoint.

On what ground will we argue suppression of music and Jesus statement? Inflammatory? We need to know if they mirandized him before the Jesus statement or after they got him in the interrogation room, you would assume before, at the time of arrest but that isnt always the case, I have seen many clients not mirandized until after they get to the police station. In Sam's case he was on his way to interrogation at the time of that statement. Could play a role the suppression of that particular Jesus statement.

Paximus wrote:On what ground will we argue suppression of music and Jesus statement? Inflammatory? We need to know if they mirandized him before the Jesus statement or after they got him in the interrogation room, you would assume before, at the time of arrest but that isnt always the case, I have seen many clients not mirandized until after they get to the police station. In Sam's case he was on his way to interrogation at the time of that statement. Could play a role the suppression of that particular Jesus statement.

It's prejudicial. The prejudice of the music and jesus statements outweigh the probative value of allowing them in the trial.

AndresEscobar wrote:

Paximus wrote:On what ground will we argue suppression of music and Jesus statement? Inflammatory? We need to know if they mirandized him before the Jesus statement or after they got him in the interrogation room, you would assume before, at the time of arrest but that isnt always the case, I have seen many clients not mirandized until after they get to the police station. In Sam's case he was on his way to interrogation at the time of that statement. Could play a role the suppression of that particular Jesus statement.

It's prejudicial. The prejudice of the music and jesus statements outweigh the probative value of allowing them in the trial.

On what grounds will the people object?

Paximus wrote:

AndresEscobar wrote:

Paximus wrote:On what ground will we argue suppression of music and Jesus statement? Inflammatory? We need to know if they mirandized him before the Jesus statement or after they got him in the interrogation room, you would assume before, at the time of arrest but that isnt always the case, I have seen many clients not mirandized until after they get to the police station. In Sam's case he was on his way to interrogation at the time of that statement. Could play a role the suppression of that particular Jesus statement.

It's prejudicial. The prejudice of the music and jesus statements outweigh the probative value of allowing them in the trial.

On what grounds will the people object?

The DA? They'll probably argue that the Jesus made me do it statement is a confession of sorts, and that the music shows he has a proclivity to fantasizing about murder and this somehow makes him more culpable. It would be stupid for the DA to really fight this because both things are pretty irrelevant. But, Prosecutors hate to lose on anything and often lose the war because they tried to win too many battles.

AndresEscobar wrote:

Paximus wrote:

AndresEscobar wrote:

Paximus wrote:On what ground will we argue suppression of music and Jesus statement? Inflammatory? We need to know if they mirandized him before the Jesus statement or after they got him in the interrogation room, you would assume before, at the time of arrest but that isnt always the case, I have seen many clients not mirandized until after they get to the police station. In Sam's case he was on his way to interrogation at the time of that statement. Could play a role the suppression of that particular Jesus statement.

It's prejudicial. The prejudice of the music and jesus statements outweigh the probative value of allowing them in the trial.

On what grounds will the people object?

The DA? They'll probably argue that the Jesus made me do it statement is a confession of sorts, and that the music shows he has a proclivity to fantasizing about murder and this somehow makes him more culpable. It would be stupid for the DA to really fight this because both things are pretty irrelevant. But, Prosecutors hate to lose on anything and often lose the war because they tried to win too many battles.

Marcia Clark a prime example of that. I think the Judge wont allow it. Its too prejudicial I agree.


Good point.

Paximus wrote:



Marcia Clark a prime example of that. I think the Judge wont allow it. Its too prejudicial I agree.


Good point.

She's also bad at shepardizing.

AndresEscobar wrote:

Paximus wrote:

AndresEscobar wrote:

Paximus wrote:On what ground will we argue suppression of music and Jesus statement? Inflammatory? We need to know if they mirandized him before the Jesus statement or after they got him in the interrogation room, you would assume before, at the time of arrest but that isnt always the case, I have seen many clients not mirandized until after they get to the police station. In Sam's case he was on his way to interrogation at the time of that statement. Could play a role the suppression of that particular Jesus statement.

It's prejudicial. The prejudice of the music and jesus statements outweigh the probative value of allowing them in the trial.

On what grounds will the people object?

The DA? They'll probably argue that the Jesus made me do it statement is a confession of sorts, and that the music shows he has a proclivity to fantasizing about murder and this somehow makes him more culpable. It would be stupid for the DA to really fight this because both things are pretty irrelevant. But, Prosecutors hate to lose on anything and often lose the war because they tried to win too many battles.

I don't know diddly about this right now - my criminal procedure class starts in May, however, that never kept me from giving anything a good stab (pardon the term in a murder discussion).

I'll bet that when they arrested him and cuffed him at the airport he was mirandized. That would be a huge mistake if they did not - that's a basic fundamental. He was in the process of fleeing a crime. If he was mirandized prior to the statement, I'll bet you it comes in.

Damn straight it's a confession...he was asked why he did it and he answered, infering that he'd done it.

The music? I would think that if Sam logged onto his music site and either listened to his own songs, or uploaded new songs during that time between the first kill and leaving Farmville, the music will be admitted. The SA would want to show what is in Sam's mind most of the time.

I mean, if a person writes about bombing people and making bombs, has a bunch of movies that involve explosives...I would think that if he actually bombs a building, that shit's coming in as evidence.

Change of venue? Good idea; state will fight it but it should happen.

How would you argue he lacked the requisite mens rea? You would think this more a voluntary manslaughter? How? Intoxication? When you've got four dead people over a span of days it's pretty hard to negate the mens rea for all.

ziggy wrote:

I don't know diddly about this right now - my criminal procedure class starts in May, however, that never kept me from giving anything a good stab (pardon the term in a murder discussion).

I'll bet that when they arrested him and cuffed him at the airport he was mirandized. That would be a huge mistake if they did not - that's a basic fundamental. He was in the process of fleeing a crime. If he was mirandized prior to the statement, I'll bet you it comes in.

Damn straight it's a confession...he was asked why he did it and he answered, infering that he'd done it.

The music? I would think that if Sam logged onto his music site and either listened to his own songs, or uploaded new songs during that time between the first kill and leaving Farmville, the music will be admitted. The SA would want to show what is in Sam's mind most of the time.

I mean, if a person writes about bombing people and making bombs, has a bunch of movies that involve explosives...I would think that if he actually bombs a building, that shit's coming in as evidence.

Change of venue? Good idea; state will fight it but it should happen.

These are evidentiary issues. It doesn't matter if he was mirandized before stating "jesus made me do it". It wont come in because it's only purpose is to prejudice the jury into making it seem like a confession. But it's not a legal confession.

The music is completely irrelevant. The only purpose of bringing it in is to unduly prejudice the jury.

What is lacking to make it a "legal confession"? Anything you say can and will be used against you....
He wasn't lead into that, he wasn't pressured - what's missing?

The defense thinks the music is merely prejudicial, but like I said if it plays an important role in his state of mind it will come in: not everything but there will be a certain amount allowed in for the prosecution's case. Like I said, you have ancillary materials that coincide with the crime committed and it is called evidence and will be allowed.

ziggy wrote:What is lacking to make it a "legal confession"? Anything you say can and will be used against you....
He wasn't lead into that, he wasn't pressured - what's missing?

The defense thinks the music is merely prejudicial, but like I said if it plays an important role in his state of mind it will come in: not everything but there will be a certain amount allowed in for the prosecution's case. Like I said, you have ancillary materials that coincide with the crime committed and it is called evidence and will be allowed.

Saying to a video camera "Jesus made me do it" is not a confession. You're trying to turn it into one, but it's not. It's also not a miranda issue. Just because someone says something after being mirandized doesn't mean it's fair game for trial. And, an off handed comment that is obviously not a confession (as Jesus, in fact, probably had nothing to do with why he did it) that serves no purpose but to inflame the jury against him will not and should not be part of the trial.

And no, the music has nothing to do with his state of mind at the time of the murders. So no, it shouldn't come in. All playing his raps and reading his lyrics does is prejudice the jury against him. This is not evidence to the murder. His music is not an ancillary material to the murders.

How is his music any different than say a child sex offender having legal forms of child porn anime book or videos in his possession? Although legal - to me they seem as relevant to his proclivity to molest children or engage in more illegal child porn just as Sam's possession of material describing murdering people, enjoying the smell of rotting bodies etc. may be evidence that he has a higher degreee of liklihood of engaging in this type of behavior than someone who did not immerse themselves in horrorcore where the base subjects of the genre are murder, rotting corpses, rape, bloody beatings and axe murdering etc?

We shall wait and see but I think any motion trying to keep this all out goes down in flames.

AndresEscobar wrote:

Saying to a video camera "Jesus made me do it" is not a confession. You're trying to turn it into one, but it's not. It's also not a miranda issue. Just because someone says something after being mirandized doesn't mean it's fair game for trial. And, an off handed comment that is obviously not a confession (as Jesus, in fact, probably had nothing to do with why he did it) that serves no purpose but to inflame the jury against him will not and should not be part of the trial.

But saying it to a video camera in an interrogation room is different? I would argue that it wasn't an off handed comment, it was an answer to a question.

I agree it is a flip comment, but it could be useful in motive - his hatred of his girlfriend's father's religion could be a motive. Mocking Jesus lends to a motive based on crushing religion which is a widely rapped about subject in horrorcore. It is common for them to mock Jesus. Now if there had not been a PASTOR's family murdered along with the pastor, then that comment would lack any substance but under these circumstances I can see the judge thinking it does have value beyond prejudice.

You can spank me and crush me in this thread - I don't care - and I forgive you for being such total defense attorneys cuz I love you both.

Let me throw this out there for you....

What if Sam called the police and let them in with four bodies in the house because he didn't see anything wrong with living with dead bodies and was in no fear of the police finding them because he could not distinguish his acts as wrong?

That's about the only behavior of his I could spin that way. Too much contradicts it though as his lying and deception with regard to Mel's parents.

Also, if he were on drugs, I would think he would NOT have had the reserve to refrain from posing images of his acts online in the three or four days he spent with the bodies.

ziggy wrote:How is his music any different than say a child sex offender having legal forms of child porn anime book or videos in his possession? Although legal - to me they seem as relevant to his proclivity to molest children or engage in more illegal child porn just as Sam's possession of material describing murdering people, enjoying the smell of rotting bodies etc. may be evidence that he has a higher degreee of liklihood of engaging in this type of behavior than someone who did not immerse themselves in horrorcore where the base subjects of the genre are murder, rotting corpses, rape, bloody beatings and axe murdering etc?

We shall wait and see but I think any motion trying to keep this all out goes down in flames.

Child porn is illegal and possession of child porn is the crime. It is not a crime to write or be in possession of bad rap.

ziggy wrote:

AndresEscobar wrote:

Saying to a video camera "Jesus made me do it" is not a confession. You're trying to turn it into one, but it's not. It's also not a miranda issue. Just because someone says something after being mirandized doesn't mean it's fair game for trial. And, an off handed comment that is obviously not a confession (as Jesus, in fact, probably had nothing to do with why he did it) that serves no purpose but to inflame the jury against him will not and should not be part of the trial.

But saying it to a video camera in an interrogation room is different? I would argue that it wasn't an off handed comment, it was an answer to a question.

I agree it is a flip comment, but it could be useful in motive - his hatred of his girlfriend's father's religion could be a motive. Mocking Jesus lends to a motive based on crushing religion which is a widely rapped about subject in horrorcore. It is common for them to mock Jesus. Now if there had not been a PASTOR's family murdered along with the pastor, then that comment would lack any substance but under these circumstances I can see the judge thinking it does have value beyond prejudice.

Yeah, but prosecution doesn't need to prove motive.

ziggy wrote:You can spank me and crush me in this thread - I don't care - and I forgive you for being such total defense attorneys cuz I love you both.

Seriously Zig, you are tough, ask good questions, and challenge me in our discussions, yet I never leave them feeling angry or bad or anything like that. The discussions we have on this board are incredible.

ziggy wrote:Let me throw this out there for you....

What if Sam called the police and let them in with four bodies in the house because he didn't see anything wrong with living with dead bodies and was in no fear of the police finding them because he could not distinguish his acts as wrong?

That's about the only behavior of his I could spin that way. Too much contradicts it though as his lying and deception with regard to Mel's parents.

Also, if he were on drugs, I would think he would NOT have had the reserve to refrain from posing images of his acts online in the three or four days he spent with the bodies.

He was in the house for around 48 hours, in my opinion. I'm not sure that he would have such a strong desire to post images of the murders online just because he was on drugs.

My PCP theory hasn't really been fleshed out, but in this imaginary PCP scenario he could have been on the drugs at the time of the murders or the first three or whatever. I just came up with it because I'm currently working on a case involving PCP. I've never done PCP and I didn't know a lot about it before. But, in my research I keep thinking "Hmm . . . This sounds like Sam's case."

Did you know that there is marijuana laced with PCP? It's a fairly common way of doing PCP.

I think its cool that we can tell eachother to stuff it and that youre wrong and nobody gets bent out of shape about it, thats the main reason I like this group, none of it is personal and I am glad nobody takes it that way. Just speak freely and state your case and if someone disagrees they wont hesitate to tell you. Thats cool.

I haven't heard of anyone lacing weed with PCP since the 70s. Bad mojo...

dangrsmind wrote:I haven't heard of anyone lacing weed with PCP since the 70s. Bad mojo...

I've read its a common way of taking PCP. Anyway, since you probably know, teach us about PCP pls.