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June 22, 2004

Sexual panic as a defense for murder

This is pretty sad. Yet another jury confirms that transgendered people are less than human in the eyes of the law. First they slapped, beat, and punched her to a bloody pulp. Then they beat her with a skillet and a soup can, put dents in the wall with her head, and tied her up. Next they dragged her into the garage where they tied a rope around her neck, hit her in the head with a shovel, and strangled her to death. That sounds like they only meant to harm her, not kill her, right?

This is what their defense attorneys argued, without disputing those basic facts:

Both Merel and Magidson's lawyers argued that Araujo's death was at most manslaughter, characterizing the murder as a crime of passion that erupted when their clients found out they had unwittingly had sex with a male. The defense also disputed the long time frame given by prosecution witnesses, arguing that the murder took place in a matter of minutes.

Well, enough jurors agreed with them for the judge to declare a mistrial:

In the case of Cazares and Merel, the jury was 10-2 against a first-degree conviction. In Magidson's case, the jury had voted 7-5 in favor of a first degree conviction.

Prosecutor's Chris Lamiero's case relied heavily on the testimony of a fourth man present the night of Araujo's death, 21-year-old Jaron Nabors. Nabors, who was also charged with murdering the teen, struck a deal with prosecutors, allowing him to plead guilty to voluntary manslaughter if he would take the stand against his friends. He will serve an 11-year sentence instead of a possible 25 years to life, and did not face the hate crime enhancement.

According to witnesses at the party, Araujo was attacked in the early morning hours of Oct. 4 after partygoers — some of whom already had suspected that the teen was a male- discovered Araujo's biological gender. Testimony in the nearly two-month trial showed that Magidson and Merel initially began beating the teen with their fists, slapping and strangling Araujo inside the Merel house.

Then, Nabors said during his testimony, Merel assaulted Araujo with a frying pan and a soup can, striking the teen's head so hard that the can dented. During his testimony during the trial's preliminary hearings, Nabors also detailed how Magidson punched and kneed Araujo's face so viciously that the plaster wall behind the victim was "indented and cracked."

Next, according to testimony, Merel, Magidson, Nabors and Cazares carried the victim into the garage, where Magidson allegedly strangled the teen with a rope and one of the defendants struck Araujo in the head with a shovel. Araujo was then tied up, thrown in the back of Magidson's truck and driven into the Sierra foothills, where the four men dug a shallow grave. After the four-hour trip, Nabors said, the defendants went to McDonald's for breakfast.

Just as a reminder, here is the definition of first degree murder:

first degree murder - n. although it varies from state to state, it is generally a killing which is deliberate and premeditated (planned, after lying in wait, by poison or as part of a scheme), in conjunction with felonies such as rape, burglary, arson, or involving multiple deaths, the killing of certain types of people (such as a child, a police officer, a prison guard, a fellow prisoner), or certain weapons, particularly a gun. The specific criteria for first degree murder, are established by statute in each state and by the U.S. Code in federal prosecutions. It is distinguished from second degree murder in which premeditation is usually absent, and from manslaughter, which lacks premeditation and suggests that at most there was intent to harm rather than to kill.

Let me ask you this. Why did they drag her into the garage if they didn't intend to kill her? Did they plan on helping her fix her car? It did not take them long to plan how to dispose of her body, either. Hell, they even stopped for breakfast.

In other words, if you ever plan to kill someone, just shave his legs, put some makeup on him, and dress him up in women's clothes. The odds are, you could walk! Just argue like the defendants did, that you flipped out and had to do it! You couldn't stand to look at "it" so you did "it" a favor and eliminated "it" in as violent a way as you could think of, in order to obliterate "it" from existance!

Justifiable homicide, right?

Posted by Mike at June 22, 2004 03:09 PM

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Matt at TopDog04.com: First they slapped, beat, and punched her to a bloody pulp. Then they beat her with a skillet and a soup can, put dents in the wall with her head, and tied her up. Next they dragged [Read More]

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