Post by Anja Nieser on Sept 4, 2006 11:56:44 GMT -5
CONNECTICUT:
Death penalty trial to begin in EH triple murder
The man accused of shooting to death his wife and their 2 young
daughters and then setting their bodies on fire inside their East Hartford
townhouse will get a first look Tuesday at those who will decide if he's
guilty - and whether he should die or spend the rest of his life in
prison.
Michael Kendall, 45, has been held in lieu of $5.3 million since his
capture a month after police found the charred bodies of his wife, Ramona
Kendall, 45, and their daughters Kayla, 16, and Alexis, 12 in December
2003.
Kendall is charged with 2 counts of capital felony, 3 counts of murder,
and 1 count of arson.
Capital felony was charged because Alexis was under 16 when she was
killed, and because more than 2 people were murdered at the same time.
The only possible penalties for a capital conviction are execution or life
in prison without release.
Senior Assistant State's Attorneys Donna Mambrino and Sandra Tullius are
prosecuting the case in Hartford Superior Court.
Kendall is represented by public defenders Patrick Culligan of that
office's Capital Defense Unit, and R. Bruce Lorenzen of the Hartford
office.
Judge Joseph Q. Koletsky will oversee the trial, which begins with a
preliminary screening of a full panel of 65 potential jurors.
East Hartford police say Ramona and Michael Kendall were in the process of
divorcing and that he was to vacate the family's Great Hill Road home by
10 a.m. Dec. 13, 2003.
But at 5:23 that morning, police and firefighters received 911 calls.
Ramona Kendall's father, Adam Alston, 71, had been staying with the family
and awakened to shouts, fire, and gunshots, police say. Alston ran out of
the house and went to his other daughter's house next door, banging on the
door and pleading for help.
Police say Alston told them that he had gotten up to use the bathroom when
he heard "loud popping" sounds. One of his granddaughters cried out, "Oh,
Daddy!" Alston told police. When he opened his door, he saw one of the
girls on the floor, not moving.
Autopsies on the 3 women showed each had been shot in the head. Each
was also burned.
Michael Kendall was immediately a suspect in the murders, but it would be
month before he was captured in Hartford -two days after a segment on the
killings was shown on the national television show, "America's Most
Wanted."
Police say Kendall had a gun in one pocket and the obituaries of Ramona,
Kayla, and Alexis in another.
Kendall wasn't unfamiliar to police: In the years leading up to the
murders, East Hartford police had been called a dozen times to investigate
domestic violence claims at the family home.
Just 15 days before she and her daughters were killed, Ramona Kendall
called police and said Michael Kendall threatened her with a gun, and that
he'd given the gun to a neighbor.
According to a civil lawsuit filed by Ramona Kendall's surviving adult
children, East Hartford police didn't find guns that Michael Kendall had
hidden in a grill behind the townhouse.
In order to secure the death penalty, prosecutors must prove one of
several aggravating factors specified in the law. In this case, Mambrino
and Tullius intend to argue that Kendall created a "grave risk of death"
to Alston, the firefighters who responded to the blaze, and neighbors in
adjoining apartments who could have been killed had the fire spread.
Mambrino prosecuted Connecticut's newest addition to death row, Eduardo
Santiago.
Santiago, 26, was convicted in 2004 of capital felony for the murder of a
West Hartford man in exchange for a broken-down snowmobile.
Santiago is 1 of 7 men on death row. The last person to be executed by
the state was Michael Ross, who gave up his appeals in his convictions
of the murders of four women in the 1980s and was put to death on May 13,
2005.
Death penalty trial to begin in EH triple murder
The man accused of shooting to death his wife and their 2 young
daughters and then setting their bodies on fire inside their East Hartford
townhouse will get a first look Tuesday at those who will decide if he's
guilty - and whether he should die or spend the rest of his life in
prison.
Michael Kendall, 45, has been held in lieu of $5.3 million since his
capture a month after police found the charred bodies of his wife, Ramona
Kendall, 45, and their daughters Kayla, 16, and Alexis, 12 in December
2003.
Kendall is charged with 2 counts of capital felony, 3 counts of murder,
and 1 count of arson.
Capital felony was charged because Alexis was under 16 when she was
killed, and because more than 2 people were murdered at the same time.
The only possible penalties for a capital conviction are execution or life
in prison without release.
Senior Assistant State's Attorneys Donna Mambrino and Sandra Tullius are
prosecuting the case in Hartford Superior Court.
Kendall is represented by public defenders Patrick Culligan of that
office's Capital Defense Unit, and R. Bruce Lorenzen of the Hartford
office.
Judge Joseph Q. Koletsky will oversee the trial, which begins with a
preliminary screening of a full panel of 65 potential jurors.
East Hartford police say Ramona and Michael Kendall were in the process of
divorcing and that he was to vacate the family's Great Hill Road home by
10 a.m. Dec. 13, 2003.
But at 5:23 that morning, police and firefighters received 911 calls.
Ramona Kendall's father, Adam Alston, 71, had been staying with the family
and awakened to shouts, fire, and gunshots, police say. Alston ran out of
the house and went to his other daughter's house next door, banging on the
door and pleading for help.
Police say Alston told them that he had gotten up to use the bathroom when
he heard "loud popping" sounds. One of his granddaughters cried out, "Oh,
Daddy!" Alston told police. When he opened his door, he saw one of the
girls on the floor, not moving.
Autopsies on the 3 women showed each had been shot in the head. Each
was also burned.
Michael Kendall was immediately a suspect in the murders, but it would be
month before he was captured in Hartford -two days after a segment on the
killings was shown on the national television show, "America's Most
Wanted."
Police say Kendall had a gun in one pocket and the obituaries of Ramona,
Kayla, and Alexis in another.
Kendall wasn't unfamiliar to police: In the years leading up to the
murders, East Hartford police had been called a dozen times to investigate
domestic violence claims at the family home.
Just 15 days before she and her daughters were killed, Ramona Kendall
called police and said Michael Kendall threatened her with a gun, and that
he'd given the gun to a neighbor.
According to a civil lawsuit filed by Ramona Kendall's surviving adult
children, East Hartford police didn't find guns that Michael Kendall had
hidden in a grill behind the townhouse.
In order to secure the death penalty, prosecutors must prove one of
several aggravating factors specified in the law. In this case, Mambrino
and Tullius intend to argue that Kendall created a "grave risk of death"
to Alston, the firefighters who responded to the blaze, and neighbors in
adjoining apartments who could have been killed had the fire spread.
Mambrino prosecuted Connecticut's newest addition to death row, Eduardo
Santiago.
Santiago, 26, was convicted in 2004 of capital felony for the murder of a
West Hartford man in exchange for a broken-down snowmobile.
Santiago is 1 of 7 men on death row. The last person to be executed by
the state was Michael Ross, who gave up his appeals in his convictions
of the murders of four women in the 1980s and was put to death on May 13,
2005.