Ryan said he was surprised by Jodi’s physical strength.
“I complimented her on being very feisty and was kind of referring to her being a lot stronger than she looks,” he said.
On cross-examination, Nurmi questioned Ryan about his expectations of Jodi’s visit to Utah.
“You were hoping for a romantic interaction?” Nurmi asked. “Were you interested in pursuing a romantic relationship with her?”
“Yes,” Ryan said.
* * *
Throughout the trial each day, Sandra Arias sat quietly in the front row behind the defense. She smiled softly as Jodi was led in and out the courtroom. She walked briskly by reporters, ignoring all requests for interviews. And when explicit photos of her daughter were shown, she dabbed tears from her eyes.
Through it all, Sandra supported her daughter and was willing to do anything she could to save Jodi’s life. Midway through the prosecution’s case, her allegiance was put to the test.
In early January, at Jodi’s request, Sandra met with the National Enquirer in a twisted scheme to help combat the growing negative public sentiment against her daughter. With her, Sandra had electronic copies of letters, supposedly written in Travis’s handwriting, describing his “deviant” sexual thoughts and discussed desires for Jodi to wear “boy’s briefs.”
“Jodi wanted me to get these letters out to the public. I am only doing this because she asked me to,” Sandra tearfully told an Enquirer reporter. “Jodi has several other letters in her possession, but she’s holding off on releasing them.”
When asked, Sandra said that the electronic copies were the only copies in existence. “Jodi told me that the originals were destroyed,” she said.
The scheme, however, backfired. Instead of publishing the letters as an exposé on Travis Alexander, the Enquirer wrote about Jodi’s desperate, last-ditch plan to walk free from jail by selling the letters, quoting anonymous sources condemning Jodi for the scheme.
“These letters are quite literally the only card Jodi has left to play,” said a source. “Getting them out to the public is her strategy to be acquitted of murder and escape the death penalty. That’s how desperate and evil she is. She’s manipulating her own mother from behind bars.”
In an attempt to further profit from the publicity of the case, in January, a family friend began selling Jodi’s art on eBay, including fifteen colored-pencil drawings she created in jail.
One series consisted of celebrities from the 1950s, including Grace Kelly, Frank Sinatra, and Lucille Ball. Others were pictures of beautiful women named after the zodiac signs. A third set included photo-realistic drawings of hands, one holding a baby’s feet.
They were initially listed from between $150 and $450 dollars. They all sold, raising thousands.
According to the auction listings all profits went toward “Jodi’s family traveling expenses to the trial, other fees, and of course money for Jodi so she can eat better food than what they serve in jail.”
At the bottom of the listing was a note from Jodi.
“Jodi thanks everyone that has helped during these tough times. Please continue to pray for her family and for Travis’s family.”
* * *
Meanwhile, in court, prosecutor Juan Martinez continued to build his case.
A detective from the Siskiyou County Sheriff’s Department testified about receipts found during the search that traced Jodi’s journey across California the week Travis was killed. An Yreka police detective also spoke about the unusual burglary at Jodi’s grandparents’ house. Photos of Jodi’s grandparents’ house were shown, including one of the gun cabinet, on top of which were stacks of quarters.
“Anything unusual about this robbery?” Martinez asked.
“Yes,” the officer said. “I believed it was unusual that small items worth money were not taken, for instance the money.”
On cross-examination, the officer admitted there had been a rash of burglaries in the Yreka area.
Following the Yreka investigator, Mesa Detective Michael Melendez detailed how the digital camera was found broken inside the washing machine.
“Just because an item is deleted does it mean that it’s gone?” Martinez asked.
“No, it does not,” Melendez said.
Martinez presented the time-stamped photo taken forty-four seconds after the last shot of Travis alive in the shower. In opening arguments the defense said the attack began forty-five seconds after the camera was dropped.
While questioning Melendez, Martinez dropped the camera for dramatic effect.
“Is that forty-five seconds?” he shouted.
* * *
On the third week of the trial, Martinez called an employee from Verizon Wireless and a Mesa detective who testified about the calls Jodi made to Travis late on the night of June 4, after she knew he was dead. Additionally, a Sprint employee discussed calls Jodi made to Travis in the days before and after his death.
A Utah police officer also took the stand relating the traffic stop and Jodi’s upside-down license plate. And Raphael Colombo Jr., the owner of the Budget in Redding, spoke about the encounter with Jodi on June 2.
“Do you remember her hair color back then?” Martinez asked.
“It was blond,” Colombo said.
The prosecution’s final witness was Leslie Udy, Jodi’s former friend.
As Leslie spoke about their friendship, Jodi, wearing a green button-down blouse, stared at her almost apoplectically, occasionally wiping away tears.
The day after the murder, when Jodi met Leslie in Utah, she had discussed her relationship with Travis.
“She said they weren’t together anymore, which I kind of already knew,” Leslie said. “But that they’d always be friends and they had joked and laughed about the fact that at some point, further on, they would see each other at Prepaid Legal events, and their children would play together and be friends.”
On cross-examination, Leslie said the fact that Jodi killed Travis ran contradictory to the person she knew. “Jodi was a soft-spoken person. She was a gentle person. I couldn’t imagine she would do something like this.”
On redirect Martinez attacked Leslie’s assessment of Jodi.
Grabbing the explicit photos of Jodi nude on Travis’s bed, he said, “Ma’am, I don’t mean to be indelicate with you, but you said you knew her.”
“Yes.” Leslie nodded.
“Did you know anything about that?” he said, as he laid a naked photo on the courtroom’s overhead projector. He then presented a shot of Alexander bleeding on his bathroom floor.
“You said you knew her well, but she never confided to you that she killed him, did she?” the prosecutor asked.
“No,” Leslie answered.
Minutes later Martinez stood at his desk. “The state rests.”
CHAPTER 37
Throughout the defense’s case, Jodi and her attorneys attempted to destroy the only thing left of Travis Alexander—his reputation.
They began by attempting to airbrush over the image created by the prosecution of Jodi as a manipulative murderer. Their first witness: Darryl Brewer. At the sight of her ex, Jodi raised her hands and touched her cheeks, as if she were blushing. Darryl, now fifty-two, walked briskly through the courtroom, wearing a dark gray suit and wire-rimmed glasses. He took his seat at the witness stand and folded his hands in front of him.
Because he didn’t want his son to be somehow associated with this case, he asked for, and was granted permission, to have his face not shown on video.
On the stand, Darryl was stoic, occasionally glancing at Jodi, but staying primarily focused on the attorney questioning him. He spoke about the details of their four-year relationship and how it abruptly shifted after she met Travis.
“Jodi became more actively religious,” Darryl said. “We stopped being intimate. Jodi told me she was saving herself for her husband.”
At the time, however, Darryl never knew about Travis.
“In the fall of 2007, were you awar
e of her being in a relationship with Travis Alexander?” Nurmi asked.
“No,” Darryl said.
On cross-examination, Martinez asked Darryl about his encounter with Jodi on June 3, 2008—the day before Travis’s murder.
“She was asking for gas cans so she could make the trip to Mesa, Arizona, wasn’t she?” Martinez asked.
“She said she needed them and was taking a long trip,” Darryl said.
It was a crucial point for Martinez. The fact that Jodi had borrowed two red gas cans a day before the murder was further evidence of premeditation. It appeared as if she had brought enough gas to avoid stopping anywhere in Arizona and avoid leaving a paper trail.
* * *
Over the next few days, the defense called several of Travis’s friends who had witnessed arguments between him and Jodi.
A former Prepaid Legal mentor spoke about seeing Jodi cry and shake after a phone call with Travis. Dan and Desiree Freeman each discussed the fights they had witnessed on their trips with the couple in the summer of 2007.
On January 30, Travis’s former girlfriend took the stand. In four years life had changed dramatically for Lisa Andrews, who by then had the last name Daidone. She was now twenty-five and married with a newborn baby.
Under questioning by Jennifer Willmott, Lisa explained her on-again, off-again eight-month relationship with Travis.
“When you were together, did you know he had cheated,” Willmott asked.
“I did not know that,” Lisa said. “I had my suspicions but I didn’t know the details of their relationship.”
At the mention of Travis’s infidelity, Jodi smiled weakly.
Throughout their relationship Lisa said she never had intercourse with Travis.
“Did he always profess to be a virgin?” Willmott asked.
“Yes,” said Lisa.
On cross-examination, Lisa told Martinez that Travis was never inappropriate, never forced himself upon her. Theirs was a “normal” relationship, she said.
Halfway through his questioning, and without warning, Martinez picked up a photograph from his desk.
“Is this what a normal relationship looks like to you?” he asked, throwing an image on the projector of Travis’s throat slit on the autopsy table.
A croaked gasp was heard from Travis’s sisters in the front row. Lisa covered her mouth with her hand. At the defense table, Jodi buried her face and sobbed.
* * *
On the thirteenth day of the trial, the defense shocked the courtroom. Kirk Nurmi’s next witness was none other than Jodi Arias.
CHAPTER 38
Jodi Arias locked eyes with each juror as the eleven men and six women filed into the courtroom.
She was dressed in beige pants and a short-sleeve black top, a strand of hair pulled to the side in a partial ponytail. Taking a deep breath, she folded her hands and took her seat on the witness stand.
It was Monday, February 2, 2013, and Jodi Arias was testifying in her own defense. At the center of the room, in a gentle tone, Kirk Nurmi began by addressing the defining issue of this case.
“Did you kill Travis Alexander on June 4, 2008?” he asked.
“Yes, I did,” Jodi said, glancing at the jury.
“Why?”
“The simple answer is that he attacked me. And I defended myself.”
Nurmi then asked about the interview Jodi gave with Inside Edition.
“In that tape you said that no jury would convict you,” he said. “Do you remember saying that?”
“I did say that,” she said softly.
“Why?” he asked.
“I made that statement in September 2008,” she said. “At the time I had plans to commit suicide. So I was extremely confident that no jury would convict me because I didn’t expect any of you to be here. I didn’t expect to be here.”
Because she was in jail monitored by an armed guard, however, she couldn’t admit to being suicidal, Jodi told the jury.
“I was very confident that no jury would convict me because I planned to be dead.” Her gaze fell to her lap. “Those are probably the most bitter words I’ll ever eat.”
Over the next eight days of direct examination, Jodi told her life story in painstaking detail. She was composed and unemotional, answering questions in a flat tone. For the majority of her testimony, she looked directly at the jury. When it turned sexually graphic, she cast her gaze downward.
While Jodi’s mother looked on from the front row, Jodi described her early childhood and the physical abuse she claimed drove her out of the house as a teenager. She explained how she bounced from relationship to relationship, while moving up and down the California coast and supporting herself as a waitress.
Most important, she spoke about the intimate details of her relationship with Travis Alexander. She described the relationship as dysfunctional and wrought with sexual abuse. She claimed Travis used his religious influence to exert control over her and demean her sexually.
During her first encounter at the Hughes house, she said she felt “obliged” to perform oral sex on him.
“I felt apprehensive, but I was going with it. I didn’t want to tell him no. I didn’t want him to feel rejected or get his feelings hurt, or spoil the mood by saying stop,” she claimed. “Even though it was uncomfortable, I kept going with it. He wasn’t aggressive but definitely doing the initiating at that point.”
Discussing the explicit details, including encounters where she both performed and received oral sex, Jodi paused for words, fidgeted with her fingers, and touched her face. At one point she paused and said, “This is embarrassing.”
Jodi claimed her second sexual encounter with Travis was about ten days after leaving Vegas, when he joined her at a Starbucks and gave her a copy of The Book of Mormon.
“He wanted oral sex … he wanted to receive it,” she said. “I was attracted to him and I wanted to do what he wanted to do. I liked him.”
“How did you feel after that encounter?” Nurmi asked.
“I don’t recall feeling really bad. Maybe just a little deflated,” she said. “He refused to kiss me afterwards because he said it was gross.”
The next time they met up was in a motel room in Ehrenberg, Arizona, where they spent the weekend having sex. After Travis left he didn’t call her for a few days.
“I hate to put it this way, but I felt a little bit used,” she said. “We get a hotel room, we have sex. We check out and he takes off. I kind of felt like a prostitute, sort of.”
Over the next few weeks, their sexual behavior continued long distance, through explicit text messages and phone sex, she testified. At one point she said he sent her a photo of his erection, which was admitted into evidence and displayed on the monitors for the jury.
Perhaps most perverse, Jodi discussed a sexual encounter that occurred the day of her baptism on November 26. Following the ceremony, Travis returned to her house where they once again became intimate.
“The kissing got more passionate, more intense. Then he spun me around. He bent me over the bed. He was on top of me,” she said. “I thought he was just going to keep kissing me.”
She had her head down, face turned to the side.
“His hands were wandering and he lifted up my skirt, and he pulled down my underwear, and he was pressing against me—his whole body,” she said. “He began to have anal sex with me.”
As Jodi explained, the interaction was painful. Through clenched teeth she told him to stop, which he did.
“After this encounter, on this spiritual day, how did you feel about yourself?” Nurmi asked.
“I didn’t feel very good,” she said. “I felt like a used piece of toilet paper.”
Meanwhile, Travis was also educating her about the Mormon religion. Although she said she was taught a little about the Law of Chastity, she believed that it only applied to intercourse.
While in private, Travis and Jodi were sexual, in Mesa their interactions were the opposite—Jodi claimed he w
ouldn’t even hold her hand.
When she pressed him on the disparity of affection, Travis encouraged her to date other people. In December Jodi went on two dates. But when Travis discovered the men were not Mormon, he grew angry, according to Jodi.
“I was sort of reprimanded for that because they weren’t church members,” she said. “He explained to me the importance of dating in the church, so I agreed with him.”
Despite their issues, in February 2007 the couple became exclusive and began traveling, crossing off destinations on the list from 1,000 Places to See Before You Die.
In court, Nurmi entered into evidence several photos of Travis and Jodi posing together during their trips.
On the monitor he presented an image of Travis and Jodi standing in the Sacred Grove in Palmyra, New York.
“Were you in love with him at the time this photo was taken?” he asked.
“Yes.” She looked down and sniffled.
A second photo was displayed, showing Travis and Jodi at the New Mexico balloon festival.
“Is this picture hard for you to look at?” Nurmi asked.
“It is very sentimental. It was happier times,” she said softly. “When you look back, you just don’t think it would end up the way it did.”
* * *
On her fourth day on the stand, Jodi began establishing the foundation for claims that Travis was a sexual deviant.
For Valentine’s Day 2007, she said she received a package with a letter, melted candy, and a gray shirt and pink shorts printed with the words TRAVIS ALEXANDER’S. Nurmi tried to present the clothing as a part of Travis’s possessive attitude toward Jodi, although she seemed to dismiss the significance.
“It was a joke that came up occasionally,” Jodi said. “I didn’t think he would actually make me a shirt like that.”
More disturbing were Jodi’s claims that the package included boy’s underwear emblazoned with the image of Spider-Man. According to Jodi, Travis wanted her to wear the underwear during sex, which she did, although she had to cut the leg holes to make them fit.
By this time, Jodi was deeply in love and willing to submit to his devious desires in an effort to please him, she said. In the spring of 2007, Jodi claimed she and Travis had vaginal sex for the first time. It began while Jodi was sleeping, without her consent, just days after they had prayed together to be more chaste, she said.
Picture Perfect: The Jodi Arias Story: A Beautiful Photographer, Her Mormon Lover, and a Brutal Murder Page 30