Court TV) — Lawyers will argue an appeal Tuesday for Susan Wright, who was convicted of luring her husband to bed with the promise of kinky sex before stabbing him almost 200 times on Jan. 13, 2003.
Wright's lawyers claim the trial court erroneously allowed Harris County prosecutor Kelly Siegler to reenact how she believed Jeff Wright was killed — by straddling atop colleague Paul Doyle in open court as he lay in the same bed where the victim was murdered.
A Houston jury rejected Wright's self-defense claims in March 2004, in which she admitted to stabbing her husband and disposing of his body in their backyard after years of sexual and physical abuse at the hands of a philandering drug abuser who gave her herpes.
In an appeal brief, Wright's lawyers say that the reenactment, "a real-time production of the most violent part of the blockbuster 'Basic Instinct,'" implanted "a vision in the jurors' minds" that lacked a factual basis.
"The very nature of the staged in-court reenactment had an emotional impact that suggests that the jury's decision be made on an emotional basis and not the basis of other relevant evidence introduced at trial," the brief says, citing case law.
Wright's attorneys cited inconsistencies regarding the clothing, appearance and size of the "actors."
"It is a convincing means of demonstrative evidence because we live in the age of television. There is something about television and the videotape that has an unspoken credibility about it," the brief states.
Appellate attorney Dan McCrory from the Harris County District Attorney's office responded in his brief that Siegler and Doyle established in court that they were similar in size to the 120-pound defendant and her husband, who weighed about 100 pounds more than she did.
He also argued that any inconsistencies between the demonstration and the actual incident were in the appellant's favor.
"The reenactment sterilized the actual murder, a murder in which appellant plunged a knife into Jeff's body in a frenzied helter-skelterish manner resulting in a room soaked and spattered in blood," the appeal reads.
"Since the reenactment was sufficiently accurate, and even minimized some of the grotesque aspects of the murder, it did not impress the jury in an irrational way."
Citing comments Siegler made to the Houston Chronicle after sentencing, Wright's lawyers also accuse Siegler of turning the murder trial into a "made-for-TV movie," even though she knew there was no factual basis for the demonstration.
"She knew the in-court reenactment of her theory of the case would make 'good courtroom drama,' and that the reenactment was based, at least in part, on speculation," says the appeal, adding Siegler's representations to the trial court were made in bad faith "given her seemingly contradictory assertions to the Chronicle."
Attorney Brian Wice will also argue that comments Siegler made in her closings invited jurors to speculate outside the facts of the case.
"Argument injecting matters not in the record is clearly improper; but argument inviting speculation is even more dangerous," they claim in their appeal. "It leaves to the imagination of each juror whatever extraneous 'facts' may be needed to support a conviction."
They claim Siegler ridiculed the appellant's self-defense claims by citing the lack of physical signs of abuse and telling jurors to go the jury room and "pound that wall as hard as you can and tell each other that she wouldn't have had a broken bone."
She also told jurors that Jeff Wright's parents, Kay and Ron, "would stand up right now and let God take them if it would bring Jeffrey back."
Wright's lawyers are seeking a new trial or, at the least, a new punishment phase.
Wright's trial lawyer, Neal Davis, had asked for a sentence of community service. She instead received 25 years in prison, which she is now serving in Marlin, Texas.
Wright's lawyers claim the trial court erroneously allowed Harris County prosecutor Kelly Siegler to reenact how she believed Jeff Wright was killed — by straddling atop colleague Paul Doyle in open court as he lay in the same bed where the victim was murdered.
A Houston jury rejected Wright's self-defense claims in March 2004, in which she admitted to stabbing her husband and disposing of his body in their backyard after years of sexual and physical abuse at the hands of a philandering drug abuser who gave her herpes.
In an appeal brief, Wright's lawyers say that the reenactment, "a real-time production of the most violent part of the blockbuster 'Basic Instinct,'" implanted "a vision in the jurors' minds" that lacked a factual basis.
"The very nature of the staged in-court reenactment had an emotional impact that suggests that the jury's decision be made on an emotional basis and not the basis of other relevant evidence introduced at trial," the brief says, citing case law.
Wright's attorneys cited inconsistencies regarding the clothing, appearance and size of the "actors."
"It is a convincing means of demonstrative evidence because we live in the age of television. There is something about television and the videotape that has an unspoken credibility about it," the brief states.
Appellate attorney Dan McCrory from the Harris County District Attorney's office responded in his brief that Siegler and Doyle established in court that they were similar in size to the 120-pound defendant and her husband, who weighed about 100 pounds more than she did.
He also argued that any inconsistencies between the demonstration and the actual incident were in the appellant's favor.
"The reenactment sterilized the actual murder, a murder in which appellant plunged a knife into Jeff's body in a frenzied helter-skelterish manner resulting in a room soaked and spattered in blood," the appeal reads.
"Since the reenactment was sufficiently accurate, and even minimized some of the grotesque aspects of the murder, it did not impress the jury in an irrational way."
Citing comments Siegler made to the Houston Chronicle after sentencing, Wright's lawyers also accuse Siegler of turning the murder trial into a "made-for-TV movie," even though she knew there was no factual basis for the demonstration.
"She knew the in-court reenactment of her theory of the case would make 'good courtroom drama,' and that the reenactment was based, at least in part, on speculation," says the appeal, adding Siegler's representations to the trial court were made in bad faith "given her seemingly contradictory assertions to the Chronicle."
Attorney Brian Wice will also argue that comments Siegler made in her closings invited jurors to speculate outside the facts of the case.
"Argument injecting matters not in the record is clearly improper; but argument inviting speculation is even more dangerous," they claim in their appeal. "It leaves to the imagination of each juror whatever extraneous 'facts' may be needed to support a conviction."
They claim Siegler ridiculed the appellant's self-defense claims by citing the lack of physical signs of abuse and telling jurors to go the jury room and "pound that wall as hard as you can and tell each other that she wouldn't have had a broken bone."
She also told jurors that Jeff Wright's parents, Kay and Ron, "would stand up right now and let God take them if it would bring Jeffrey back."
Wright's lawyers are seeking a new trial or, at the least, a new punishment phase.
Wright's trial lawyer, Neal Davis, had asked for a sentence of community service. She instead received 25 years in prison, which she is now serving in Marlin, Texas.
