by Shanna Hogan
To assist with what was expected to be a complex defense, Spencer called his friend Susanne Gustin, an experienced criminal defense attorney with more than seventeen years of trial experience, to be the defense’s second chair. Intelligent and adept, Gustin was accustomed to representing high-profile cases. “I have a reputation for handling major crimes,” she later said. As one of the few women in a male-dominated field of criminal defense, her motto on her Web site is: “A woman on your side.”
Gustin was in her early forties, with long blond hair that framed her round, tanned face. She is a fourth-generation lawyer and attended law school at the University of Utah, where she also studied political science and Middle East studies as an undergrad. After a short stint in civil work, she joined the public defense office—a fast-paced environment, where she tried up to three cases a week.
She soon found her niche and the calling that would dominate the rest of her career—trying cases related to rape and child sex. “Child and sex abuse cases are difficult,” Gustin later explained. “In the public defender’s office, when you win one, you can return to the office the next day and find five new sex cases sitting on your chair.”
After five years as a public defender, Gustin left to open her own firm in Salt Lake City, where she was known primarily for representing sex criminals. Her Web site includes a lengthy list of recent victories, which included charges for child rape, sodomy of a child, aggravated sexual abuse of a child, and kidnapping.
Gustin also happened to be the mother of a nine-year-old son at the time.
With Gustin’s experience and persuasive delivery, combined with Spencer’s intelligence, Martin had a capable defense team. Spencer and Gustin immediately got to work, filing a slew of motions that would congest the case in court.
They spent thousands of hours interviewing sources and sorting through evidence. Although they were privately retained, neither was paid.
* * *
Martin settled into Utah County Jail, which would be his home for the next year. Estranged from his kids and with Gypsy out of his life, he had no one to write. Besides his attorneys, he had no visitors.
Martin occupied his time writing poetry and working on his autobiography while studying his case file in order to assist with his defense. He also volunteered to be a jail trustee, an inmate who performs menial tasks like taking out trash, mopping, or distributing uniforms.
In December, Martin met an inmate named Jason Poirier, a twenty-year-old misdemeanor shoplifter and married father of a daughter. Poirier was in jail on a probation violation and facing up to a year in prison.
His criminal record had begun when he was eighteen, with a charge of misdemeanor sexual battery for sleeping with a girl who was fourteen. He had a track record of petty crimes: selling prescription pills, using steroids, and selling fake Rolex watches.
In early 2012, he was arrested for stealing a laptop from Walmart. Months later, while on probation, he was busted again for stealing ammunition from Cabella’s, a hunting and fishing store. When his house was subsequently searched, guns and weapons were found—another probation violation.
While he was in jail, Poirier’s wrist began bothering him and he complained to the nursing staff. Martin overheard and examined his wrist, telling Poirier he had carpal tunnel syndrome.
“What, are you a doctor or something?” Poirier asked.
“Yes, I am,” Martin replied.
Poirier followed Martin’s advice and the pain went away.
They spoke again when Martin was handing out uniforms from the commissary and Poirier made a comment about the type of special shoes Martin wore due to his toe condition. The two became friendly. They wrote poetry together, and Martin allowed him to read parts of his autobiography.
* * *
Before Martin MacNeill could stand trial for murder, there would be a preliminary hearing to determine whether there was enough evidence to warrant a trial. At the end it would be up to Judge Samuel McVey to decide if there was probable cause to proceed.
Given that the case was largely circumstantial, Grunander, the prosecutor, was worried it would not get past the judge’s review and make it to trial.
In October 2012, for six days, nearly two dozen witnesses took the stand.
Martin’s former coworkers spoke about his demeanor on April 11, 2007. The neighbors testified about finding Michele in the bathtub. Police and first responders also took the stand to tell accounts of Martin’s frenzied and hysterical demeanor as they tried to revive his wife. Anna Osborne Walthall told the judge about Martin’s murderous claims during their affair.
And on the fifth day, Gypsy took the stand. It was the first time she and Martin had seen each other in four years, and they both looked quite different. Martin, then fifty-six, appeared elderly and thin, barely resembling his once handsome self. And in prison Gypsy had gained a significant amount of weight.
Yet there still seemed to be an attraction. At one point, Gypsy and Martin exchanged a glance and smiled at each other. Gypsy would later say that seeing Martin stirred up strong feelings.
“I would look at him and remember our life together. I don’t think anyone could do that and not feel something. Most of it is just sorrow that it didn’t work,” Gypsy said in one interview. “But I loved Martin, and I don’t think that was a bad thing.”
During her testimony, she detailed her clandestine relationship with her married lover. “I thought he was wonderful,” she said. “It was just for fun, just exciting.”
As she left the courtroom, Gypsy locked eyes with Martin, then reached out slightly and ran her fingers along the defense table.
Following Gypsy’s testimony, Michelle Savage and her daughter Brandi Smith both answered questions concerning their former roommate’s alleged desire to murder her lover’s wife. Later, Rachel, Vanessa, and Sabrina gave accounts of how it slowly became evident that the new nanny was really their father’s mistress. Perhaps most heartbreaking, Ada bravely testified about finding her dead mother and running to get help. “I kind of pulled him along to the bathroom,” Ada said.
Then, the daughter who had led the fight against her father took the stand. “I loved my father,” Alexis testified. “I thought he loved us.”
Through it all, Martin was stoic, showing no hint of emotion, as Michele’s sister Linda Cluff observed from her seat in the gallery.
“He sat there stone-faced and cold. I would have expected nothing different from Martin,” Linda wrote on her Web site. “This was not a surprise. This is precisely the Martin I have always known.”
As the tragic details of her sister’s final days unraveled, Linda ached inside. She found her mind drifting back to fonder memories. “I would hear the proceedings, but would have to, at times, take my mind back to our innocent childhood days as sisters,” Linda wrote. “I would reflect back upon some good memories.”
* * *
At the end of the six-day hearing, Judge Samuel McVey ruled that Martin would stand trial, stating to the court that his actions showed “evidence of a guilty mind.”
Shackled and wearing a jumpsuit, Martin cocked his head slightly but otherwise showed no emotion.
Elated by the judge’s decision, Alexis left the courtroom in tears. “My mother deserves to be fought for,” she told reporters. “It’s just a big relief because this has been such a fight.”
Martin pleaded not guilty to murder and obstruction of justice, his defense being that Michele’s death was natural. The trial was originally scheduled for March 2013, but would be delayed multiple times.
During the next twelve months, the defense filed a series of formidable pretrial motions, the majority of which they won. Witnesses were barred from making several statements and presenting key facts, including that Martin kicked his adult daughters out of the house. Because the judge ruled the comment hearsay, Alexis would not be able to tell the jury that her mom stated, “If anything happens to me, make sure it wasn’t your dad.”
Pro
secutors could not refer to Michele as a “victim,” except in opening and closing statements. Anna Osborne Walthall wasn’t allowed to tell the jury about any of the murders she said Martin claimed to have committed and could speak only of their affair and his comment about injecting a person with potassium to cause a heart attack. And, ultimately, prosecutors dropped their fight to call Michelle Savage and Brandi Smith to testify, after evidence seemed to prove that the women didn’t live with Gypsy during her affair with Martin.
Many of the defense’s motions would be aimed directly at the MacNeill children. The defense tried to prevent Rachel from testifying because of her bipolar disorder and keep Vanessa off the stand due to her drug addiction. They would lose both of those fights. But during the trial the defense would successfully bar Ada’s testimony, by arguing that her recollection had been tainted by her sisters.
Perhaps most unsettling, in a December 2012 motion, the defense seemed to suggest Damian might have been involved in his mother’s murder. “Investigators in the Utah County Attorney’s Office deemed Damian MacNeill to be a very dangerous individual who possessed homicidal impulses and discussed the ‘joys of killing,’” defense attorneys wrote in a motion.
However, the defense also claimed that Michele’s death was natural and not homicide.
Meanwhile, the case concerning Martin’s 2007 forcible sexual abuse of Alexis was also moving forward. In October, three years after the charges were refiled, the Utah Court of Appeals returned with its decision, siding with prosecutors that there was enough evidence to proceed to trial. But while the felony sexual abuse charges were allowed to stand, the judge dismissed the witness-tampering complaint.
In that case Martin also pleaded not guilty.
* * *
While prosecutors clashed with Martin’s defense team in court, the investigator Jeff Robinson continued to seek out witnesses. That mission led him to Texas.
In January 2013, Robinson visited Texarkana federal prison to interview three inmates with whom Martin had served time. Unbeknownst to Martin, his workout buddy during his prison stay had a long history as a federal informant. While he was serving time in an Oklahoma prison, Von Harper’s testimony had led to the arrest and conviction of twenty-six people.
Speaking with Robinson, Harper said he was willing to testify but that Martin had never admitted to killing his wife. “The only thing he said is that she had drowned,” Harper told Robinson.
Inmate Frank Davis told Robinson a similar story but added that Martin called his wife a bitch. Former cellmate George Martinez also recounted Martin’s statements that “they can’t prove it was me.”
While Martin never revealed to these fellow inmates how he may have killed Michele, Robinson considered the statements suspicious. All three inmates told similar tales: Martin claimed his wife drowned, called her a bitch, and said police had no evidence.
Harper, Davis, and Martinez would all testify against Martin. While each angled for a deal to get leniency in their sentences, Robinson informed them that as a state investigator he had little authority or influence on their federal charges.
Robinson returned to Utah, slightly disheartened. A few weeks later, however, he heard from an attorney who was representing an inmate currently serving time with Martin in Utah County lockup—Jason Poirier.
On January 31, Robinson interviewed Poirier. When the investigator learned what he had to say, his ears perked up. Describing one of their first encounters, while Poirier collected his uniform, Poirier related a joke Martin made about getting away with things in jail. “For instance, I killed my wife. That should say a lot.”
“I sat back and kind of chuckled, thinking he was lying,” Poirier later testified. “I got the clothes from him and went back to my cell.”
Soon after, when Poirier learned Martin’s wife was really dead, he offered sympathy.
“Hey man,” Poirier told Martin. “I apologize about your wife.”
“I’m glad the bitch is dead,” Martin responded gruffly.
Poirier said that while swapping poetry, Martin told the younger inmate that he killed his wife because the marriage was going downhill and she would not allow him to continue to cheat.
Robinson found the information valuable—no one else claimed Martin had actually admitted to murder. In exchange for his testimony, Robinson told Poirier and his attorney he would support a plea deal. During a subsequent recorded phone call with his wife, the inmate was cocky. “Listen carefully. I can tell you right now they need me,” Poirier said.
Then in May, Robinson would receive an e-mail message possibly uncovering the final piece of the puzzle: how Michele died.
* * *
March 5 should have been the beginning of the trial. Instead, the attorneys were continuing to plow through motions while hurling insults and allegations of misconduct.
The defense claimed the prosecution intentionally withheld one thousand pages of documents—some of which they said included information supporting Martin’s innocence. Due to this, Spencer tried to get prosecutors disqualified or the charges dismissed.
At one point things became so heated that Judge McVey reprimanded the attorneys for finger-pointing, calling it a distraction. In court, the war between the prosecution and defense became ugly, Grunander admitted. “You can never expect a case like this to be completely amicable,” he explained. “But I think it did get personal … Inflammatory remarks were made—allegations that have never before been leveled against our offices. It was a hard-fought battle.”
After the judge rejected the motion to dismiss prosecutors, the defense successfully got McVey tossed from the case—just weeks before the trial date. The motion to remove the judge was sealed, so the exact details were unknown, but according to Utah code, a judge can be disqualified based on bias, prejudice, or a conflict of interest. McVey would remain the judge on the sexual assault trial scheduled for December.
The murder case was reassigned to Judge Derek Pullan. Described by attorneys as knowledgeable, attentive, and considerate, Pullan was wiry and balding, with narrow eyes and a measured tone of voice. In 1993, Pullan had received his law degree from Brigham Young University. After college he worked as a clerk for the Utah Supreme Court before serving as a deputy county attorney in Washington and Utah in the 1990s. In 2003, he was appointed to Utah’s Fourth District Court. In addition he was an adjunct professor at BYU.
Pullan quickly got up to speed on the case and sorted through the remaining pretrial motions.
* * *
After being locked up in Texarkana, Martin’s former computer classmate Michael Buchanan had been transferred to Louisiana to serve the remainder of his nine-year sentence. During the last few months, Buchanan had thought little of Martin, but in April a fellow former inmate from Texarkana approached him.
“You know Doc got out, right?” the prisoner said. “Did you hear what happened?”
“No,” said Buchanan.
“He got arrested for the murder of his wife!”
Suddenly Buchanan’s mind raced back to those disturbing conversations with the doctor in the rec yard. What Martin had told him was so heinous, he hadn’t known whether to believe him.
Over the next few weeks, Buchanan spoke with prison counselors and family members, debating whether to come forward to speak with prosecutors. Maybe if he agreed to testify, he could get a reduction in his sentence, he pondered. On May 19, he e-mailed his niece, Raven.
“One of the guys I met here mentioned Dr. MacNeill,” Buchanan wrote. “He said Doc got out and was out for two months and got arrested again. If his case is not over I could tell them what I know and testify and maybe come home.”
Raven contacted police at her uncle’s request, and the tip eventually reached Robinson. Weeks later Robinson flew to Louisiana to meet with Buchanan.
“He told me how he did it,” Buchanan told the investigator.
When the news reports had first reached the prison, Buchanan said, Martin was dismis
sive and denied the murder. But slowly, he began to reveal details, claiming he’d dosed his wife with prescription pain relievers and sleeping pills.
“He gave her bigger and bigger doses but she didn’t die, so he convinced her to take a bath, hoping she would pass out and drown, but she didn’t on her own,” Buchanan told Robinson. He said that Martin then explained what he did next.
“I had to help her out,” Martin had said.
“What do you mean?” Buchanan had asked.
“I had to hold her under the water for a little while,” Martin had replied.
Martin also alluded to administering the drugs rectally, by crushing the pills and delivering them through an enema. And Martin had explained his motive.
“He said that she was in the way,” Buchanan told Robinson. “That she wanted the house and the kids.”
* * *
This new information was enticing for Robinson. It seemed to answer the question on everyone’s mind: How?
In a last-ditch attempt to change the Utah State pathologist’s mind about the cause of death, Robinson contacted Dr. Todd Grey, providing him with a report on the upcoming testimony of all the inmates. He asked Grey to reconsider drowning as a cause of death.
But Grey remained firm in his opinion. “I have reviewed the materials you sent,” Grey wrote in an e-mail to Robinson in August. “While the different interviews certainly add to the suspicions that Dr. MacNeill caused or played a significant role in his wife’s death, I don’t find anything in the materials so compelling that it overcomes the lack of physical evidence from the autopsy that would prove Michele was the victim of homicide.”
Fearful that a jury would be unable to convict Martin with no decisive finding of murder, Robinson would continue investigating the case up until six weeks before trial.
* * *
Jury selection finally began on October 15, 2013. While most states require twelve jurors to try a case, Utah is one of a handful of states that requires only eight. Five men and three women were selected.