by Sue Russell
‘No.’
William Miller cross-examined Lee’s ex-lover, establishing that Lee supported her when she was unemployed. That Lee rarely told her about her work because she knew Ty didn’t like her doing it. That Lee had told her life on the road was dangerous. Ty also conceded that Lee had told her of being raped and beaten prior to their meeting. Miller established their heavy drinking habits. His next goal was to have Ty confirm some of Lee’s good points. She had never been physically abusive to Ty. Never struck her. She was protective of her. Loved her. Said she’d do anything for her. Even said she’d die for her. Said it over and over again, Miller asked?
Ty hedged. She didn’t know if it had been said more than once. Miller reminded Ty that in her deposition, given the previous November, she’d said that Lee said exactly that throughout their relationship.
‘If it’s there, I said it,’ Ty shrugged.
Miller wanted the jury to know that Lee had been drunk that morning she returned with Richard Mallory’s Cadillac. He also wanted the jury to know that Ty had left Lee when the composite sketches were released and she became afraid.
‘You were scared you might be arrested?’
‘Because I knew I was driving the car when it happened … and I wrecked …’
‘And so, you went to Pennsylvania?’
‘No.’
‘I’m sorry, you went to Ohio?’
‘Yes.’
Miller had suddenly had Tyria teetering on the brink of Williams Rule territory. As those privy to the case knew, but the jurors did not, the car she referred to was that of Peter Siems, the missing missionary. Quickly, Miller changed the subject.
He led Ty through being contacted by investigators Bruce Munster and Jerry Thompson in Pennsylvania, being brought to Volusia, and making the recorded phone calls that led Lee to confess. Yes, she wanted Lee to say certain things in those calls, to clear herself. Yes, she had lied to Lee about her reason for coming to Florida, about who she was with, and about the calls not being recorded. Miller also wanted the jurors to see the treachery. While Lee had continued to reaffirm her love for Ty, to say she’d do anything for her, Ty had used a suicide threat to bait Lee into confessing.
‘I really don’t know why I said that,’ Tyria said flatly and unapologetically. She was worried and very scared. Miller wanted to drive home that it wasn’t enough for Ty to have Lee clear her, she also wanted Lee to confess.
‘You wanted her to say that she did do it, that she did all the homicides?’ Miller asked.
‘Basically, yeah.’
‘So, her saying that you were totally innocent didn’t have anything to do with any of this, is that right?’
‘No.’
‘There were at least ten phone calls, and it was only at the end of those calls, on the last one, that you got what you wanted? Is that true?’
‘I believe so, yes.’
The jury and the witness, Tyria Moore, had been ushered from the courtroom while Judge Blount instructed the defence on what was and was not beyond the scope of direct examination with regard to the much talked-about movie deal and Bruce Munster’s dealings with Tyria Moore. The judge had no intention of allowing the events of January 1991 to impede justice being served on the events of 1 December 1989.
After everyone trooped back in, Miller questioned Ty on Bruce Munster’s suggesting that he get her a lawyer.
‘And that lawyer’s name was Mr Bradshaw?’
‘Yes.’
‘In case someone came to you about a book and movie deals?’
‘Right.’
‘And Mr Bradshaw was assisting Mr Munster in his book and movie deals, correct?’
‘I know he was an attorney that Mr Munster had spoken with.’
‘And Mr Munster was asking if you wanted to get in with him, right?’
‘Asking me if I would like to use the same attorney, yes.’ Miller brought up her relationship with FDLE agent, Rose Giansanti, who had often been assigned to accompany her. (Away from the court, Pralle wondered if the two women’s relationship went beyond the professional.) Ty valued Rose’s opinion.
‘You liked to talk to her about things like that, correct? I mean, she’s someone you trusted?’
‘Correct.’
‘And you called her and asked her opinion on the book and movie deals?’
‘Correct.’
‘And when you did that, you spoke with her about some monetary figures?’
‘Something that, yeah, was mentioned.’
‘In fact, the figure mentioned was $50,000, correct?’
‘That could have been, yes.’
Ty betrayed her lover, Ty was in with the cops, and Ty was out to get rich, so the message went.
David Damore stood up to question Ty again. He showed her a photograph of Peter Siems’s car and had her confirm it was the one she referred to when she said that she and Ms Wuornos had been in a wreck in July. A different car from the one in which they’d moved. Damore had her reiterate that Lee had never complained of being physically abused while they lived together. That she’d never seen her looking as if she’d been beaten.
Damore then sought to redress the balance on the phone calls. Lee wasn’t the poor victim the defence made her out to be. During those calls, Lee had repeatedly asked Ty to lie for her, to lie and say it was mistaken identity.
‘When you told her that you wouldn’t lie for her, did she tell you that it was mistaken identity, that the police had the wrong woman?’
‘Yes, she did.’
‘Did she ever suggest to you during any of those three days of telephone calls to your hotel that she had been raped or harmed in any way by Richard Mallory?’
‘No, she didn’t.’
Neither had Lee ever suggested that Richard Mallory had done anything to provoke her attack on him, Ty agreed.
Damore also wanted the jury to know that Aileen had written to Ty and told her that she wanted her to be the beneficiary of any proceeds from a movie deal. And he wanted them to know that Sergeant Munster had said that no one in law enforcement would profit from any deals.
‘Isn’t that true that he told you that they couldn’t get one red cent?’
‘Yes, I believe he said that.’
‘Isn’t it true that you told him you wanted nothing to do with the movie deal? That you didn’t think it was right for anybody to get a penny?’
‘At a point in time, yes, I did.’
Damore’s voice was strident and emphatic, underlining each word, as he went on to say: ‘Have you ever taken one cent from anyone involving a movie deal, or the knowledge you have in this case, or the story, or your life with Aileen Wuornos, since the first day that you met with police officers and told them that she had told you about shooting Richard Mallory?’
‘No, I haven’t.’
Damore kept going. ‘Isn’t it true that you wanted to be left alone? To be able to live your life …’
Billy Nolas, who had been making repeated objections, was thoroughly frustrated. ‘Objection, Your Honour. There’s a witness on the stand, we’re not at the podium.’
Undeterred, Damore moved on: ‘The defendant wrote to you and offered to pay you money, did she?’
‘Yes.’
‘And she wanted to be involved in a movie deal, to sell her story, didn’t she?’
Billy Nolas was back on his feet, complaining again to the judge about Damore’s leading questions. Damore changed tack. ‘When you told Aileen Wuornos that you wouldn’t lie for her, she then tried to come up with “It was a mistake”?’
‘Correct.’
Damore hadn’t finished. ‘Did she tell you what she would do to the authorities if they couldn’t come up with some evidence to tie her into it?’
‘I believe she put it that she would have a big lawsuit on them.’
‘Yes. Lawsuit-happy.’
‘Yes.’
‘Objection!’ cried Bill Miller. The judge sustained his objection but the jury had heard Mr D
amore’s commentary.
William Miller stood up. He was going back to Ty’s conversation with Bruce Munster about a book and movie deal. Hadn’t Munster said that only a portion of the money would go elsewhere? Ty reiterated that Munster had said they’d get no money from it. But Miller brought out that Ty had been told she could get a portion of it, though.
‘Do you recall having conversations with Rose Giansanti wherein you said to her, “Do you know what I could do with $50,000?” Do you recall saying that?’
‘No, I don’t.’
‘And in fact, if Miss Giansanti says that you did say that she’s—’
‘Objection, Your Honour!’ Miller was interrupted.
He changed direction. ‘Regarding the statements on the phone, in fact, Lee Wuornos did tell you several times that she acted in self-defence, did she not?’
‘I don’t recall that.’
‘You don’t recall?’
‘No.’
Bill Miller had had the final, anticlimactic words with Tyria Moore.
46
The prosecution next called investigator Horzepa. And the officer who had heard the defendant confess to seven murders would bring the Williams Rule issue to a head.
Under Tanner’s questioning he moved from the discovery of Richard Mallory’s body to the focus, almost a year later, on the suspects, Tyria Moore and Cammie Greene. He painted the picture for the jury. The pawn shop search. Cammie Greene’s thumbprint on the ticket that led to Lori Grody, who then turned out to be Aileen Wuornos. The arrest. The taped calls between Ty and Lee.
John Tanner set about clearing up any impression that there was any evidence whatsoever that Ty was involved in the Mallory homicide or the theft of his car. In referring to ‘the Mallory case’, however, Tanner kept veering into the province of the admissibility of mention of the other homicides to which she had confessed. Billy Nolas made repeated objections and moves for a mistrial. The judge noted both but moved on.
Tanner led Horzepa through the evidence, the Polaroid camera, the storage unit key. He established that Lee had been read her Miranda Rights by Bruce Munster before he and Horzepa taped her interview on 16 January. Horzepa conjured up for the jury a word picture of the three-hour exchange that followed and what it had revealed. But the Similar Fact Evidence issue kept rearing its head. At one point, Tricia Jenkins herself wandered into the danger zone, asking Horzepa, ‘When you talked to Aileen Wuornos, January 16, she told you over and over and over, she’d acted in self-defence, didn’t she?’
‘Not in reference to Mr Mallory,’ Horzepa answered.
And there it was again. Once the jury had left the courtroom, Judge Blount pointed out to Jenkins: ‘You elicited the answer, ma’am!’ But he announced that he would hear the lawyers and make his ruling first thing the next morning. The jurors returned to their seats and Jenkins resumed her questioning of Horzepa.
She didn’t name Chastity Marcus but she did want the jury to know that another woman, a nude dancer, had once been arrested for Mallory’s murder and extradited from Louisiana. She definitely wanted them to know that Mallory frequented seedy establishments. She would have liked them also to know that Jackie Davis had told Horzepa that her ex became paranoid when he’d been drinking. The judge sustained the prosecution’s objection. But the jury had heard it. In similar fashion, they got the message that Mallory liked porn.
(Out of the presence of the jury, the prosecution had already accused the defence of trying to assassinate the dead man’s character with hearsay testimony.)
Jenkins also noted that in her videotaped interview, Lee had said both that she wasn’t about to let someone rape her, and that the killing wasn’t intentional.
Redressing the balance on redirect, John Tanner read to Horzepa, from the transcript of the videotape, some of Lee’s more damning statements. During Larry Horzepa’s eventful afternoon on the stand, four motions for a mistrial were denied.
The prosecution made a persuasive argument for having their Similar Fact Evidence included. They’d prepared a huge chart tabulating the similarities, and very compelling they were, too. Besides being able to tell the jury about Lee’s bloody handprint being found on Peter Siems’s wrecked car, the prosecution wanted them to hear about all the other common factors. That personal property had been stolen from all the victims. That the car keys had been taken. That a number of the men’s pockets had been turned inside out.
Tanner wanted to be able to hammer home with full force all the evidence that pointed to a robbery plan and premeditation. All the victims were white males who’d picked her up hitchhiking. John Tanner argued that if the similar fact was allowed, he could establish her pattern of killing along the Florida highways and that would speak specifically to Lee’s self-defence plea. Not only was Ty not present, but during some homicides she wasn’t even in the state, he argued.
David Damore pointed out to Judge Blount that they would establish that some victims were shot in the back when helpless. Shot in the back while in locations and positions where they couldn’t have inflicted any injury to Wuornos.
John Tanner enumerated the findings of the various cars and bodies. The videotape, he argued, was virtually impossible to edit so it would pertain only to Mr Mallory. Looking thoughtful, he read quotes from the transcript of that videotaped confession to the judge. Of Dick Humphreys, Tanner said, Wuornos had told the investigators that she thought she shot him three times.
“I think. Oh, yeah, he stumbled and fell. Oh, yeah, I remember … ’cause he pissed me off and everything. I felt sorry for him ’cause he was gurgling. Well, I shot him in the head and tried to put him out of his misery.’
Bunky was getting the picture.
Billy Nolas argued for the defence. He claimed that the state had put forward a propensity argument and that that was what the jurors would hear, that it didn’t meet the Williams Rule, and that the collateral crimes evidence would become the thrust of the trial: ‘It’ll be, either Miss Wuornos is guilty in all these cases … or in none of these cases.’
Richard Mallory, and the specific charges Lee was facing, would get lost in the shuffle, Nolas argued.
He also pointed to discrepancies between the homicides: in where the men were shot, their ages, how they were clothed, geography. The area was northern Florida which covers a lot of ground, he pointed out. ‘We could say it happened in the western hemisphere!’
Judge Blount rubbed his chin thoughtfully, but his mind was made up. The Similar Fact Evidence would be allowed by the court.
The prosecution downplayed their pleasure, at least in public. The judge’s ruling was a major victory for them—and a serious blow to the defence who would, of course, have Judge Blount’s ruling at the forefront of any future appeals. But the jurist was not weighed down by any doubts.
After the jury was seated, he explained that they would be hearing of other crimes allegedly committed by the defendant, Miss Wuornos, but that they’d be hearing about them for very specific reasons: ‘For the limited purpose of providing motive, opportunity, intent, preparation, plan, knowledge, identity, the absence of mistake or accident on the part of the defendant. And you shall consider it only as it relates to these issues.’
The defendant, he said finally, was not on trial for any crime not included in her indictment in that courtroom.
Lee, meanwhile, was grimacing, visibly furious. Turning around to look at Arlene Pralle, she hissed, ‘I can’t believe this! I’m up on one case!’
Once back on the stand, Larry Horzepa explained the prosecution’s body-and-car map to the jury and used it to point out where Richard Mallory and his car had been found. The prosecution was ready to roll. Horzepa was succeeded by a long procession of detectives, investigators, crime scene analysts, pathologists, evidence technicians. All the bearers of sombre news, confirming the prosection’s contention that these men had each died at the end of a .22, and had each been robbed of their personal property and vehicles.
Every wi
tness, adding their particular piece of the puzzle, helped build for the jury a horrifying picture of multiple murder. Hearing about the other victims, even in this limited fashion, drove home the chilling nature of the case. Their faces didn’t say it, but how could they help but think it? One time, it might have been self-defence. Maybe twice. One time, it might have been accidental or unintentional. Maybe twice. Maybe three times. But the jury was getting a loud and clear message about the abundance of evidence against the defendant.
Lee drummed her fingers on the table and hissed more furious comments, this time in the ear of William Miller, seated beside her. Meanwhile, the jury heard exactly what the defence had hoped they would not. Like how Dick Humphreys died as the result of seven bullets, one to the back of the head. It would be hard for the jury to suspend their doubts about Lee’s guilt in the face of this authoritative onslaught. Although many of the gory photographs were kept out by Nolas’s arguments and the judge’s rulings, the point was nevertheless seeping across. The men had met horrible deaths, their bodies had ruthlessly been left to rot.
Observers could not help but note the difference in the demeanours of two key figures in the courtroom. Lee and Letha Prater. As John Tanner read aloud some of her killing quotes, Lee, her mood improved, grinned cheerfully at Arlene Pralle, oblivious to any incongruity. At other equally inappropriate moments, she mouthed, ‘I love you!’
Letha Prater was having a hard time sitting listening to the evidence, ‘and looking across and seeing her there and knowing what she did’. Investigator John Tilley had tried to persuade her to leave when testimony began on Buddy and she’d planned to, but she changed her mind. She sat, still, staring into space. Her ashen face, a study in quiet, dignified pain, was turned away at a right angle to the court.
Six bullets in David Spears’s body. Lee’s bloody palmprint on Peter Siems’s car. Donald Champagne, the soft-spoken firearms expert, returned to compare the bullets from one homicide to another. Those in Richard Mallory’s body were the same CCI Stingers brand as those in Dick Humphreys’. Same six right-twist, all hollow-points. The bullets in David Spears had been examined microscopically and also fitted those criteria.