By BRIAN SKOLOFF
Associated Press
PHOENIX (AP)
-- Jodi Arias has concluded her testimony after 18 days on the witness
stand in her Arizona death penalty trial.
She's
charged with first-degree murder in the June 2008 death of Travis
Alexander in his suburban Phoenix home. Authorities say she planned the
attack on her lover in a jealous rage. Arias says it was self-defense.
Prosecutor
Juan Martinez spent much of the day Wednesday questioning Arias over
repeated lies in the case and her self-proclaimed memory lapses from the
day of the killing.
Jurors also had about 10
additional questions for Arias. Last week, the panel posed about 220
questions and made it clear they aren't satisfied with her explanations.
Arizona law allows jurors to quiz defendants through written questions
read aloud by the judge.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP's earlier story is below.
A
prosecutor questioning Jodi Arias in her Arizona death penalty trial on
Wednesday repeatedly pointed at her and angrily raised his voice as he
said it was impossible for the killing of her boyfriend to have occurred
the way she contends.
Arias is charged with
first-degree murder in the June 2008 death of Travis Alexander in his
suburban Phoenix home. Authorities say she planned the killing in a
jealous rage, but Arias says it was self-defense when Alexander attacked
her after a day of sex.
On Wednesday, Arias
took the witness stand for the 18th day. Prosecutor Juan Martinez showed
her two photographs taken 62 seconds apart - one of Alexander alive in
the shower, the other a portion of his bloodied body.
Arias
has said she was taking provocative pictures of Alexander in the shower
when she dropped his camera and he became enraged, forcing her to fight
for her life.
"You drop the camera ... you
are body-slammed, you get away, you go down the hallway, you go in the
closet, you get the gun, you go into the bathroom ... You shoot him, he
goes down ... and then, after you're able to get away, you go get the
knife and you end up at the end of the hallway? All of this in 62
seconds?" Martinez snapped.
"No, that's not
what I'm saying," Arias replied, reminding the prosecutor of her memory
gaps from the day of the killing. "Definitely after the gun went off
... I don't know, it starts to get a little more confusing."
Martinez is trying to show Arias took time to think about what she was doing during the attack.
"You
didn't have the knife in your hand when you shot him," he said. "So
that means, if you didn't have the knife in your hand, you had to go get
it from somewhere, right?"
"I don't know," Arias replied.
Alexander
suffered nearly 30 knife wounds, was shot in the head and had his
throat slit before Arias dragged his body into his shower.
Arias
has said she remembers little from the day of the killing but recalls
Alexander attacking her in a fury. She says she ran into his closet to
retrieve a gun he kept on a shelf and fired in self-defense. She said
she has no memory of stabbing him.
Martinez
seized on her memory lapses, noting it seemed unusual she could remember
some key details, like Alexander screaming at her and threatening her
life, but not much else.
"You don't remember anything, right?" Martinez asked loudly.
"In general there is a huge gap," Arias replied softly, her eyes fixed on jurors.
The
questioning elicited repeated objections from defense attorneys as
Arias often replied smugly to yes or no questions with answers such as
"If you say so" and "I presume."
"I would like some certainty from you," Martinez barked at one point.
Arias
has acknowledged trying to clean the scene of the killing, dumping the
gun in the desert and leaving the victim a voicemail on his cellphone
hours later in an attempt to avoid suspicion. She says she was too
scared and ashamed to tell the truth.
Arias'
grandparents had reported a .25-caliber handgun stolen from their
Northern California home about a week before Alexander's death - the
same caliber used to shoot him - but Arias says she didn't take it.
Authorities believe she brought it with her.
Since
testimony began in early January, none of Arias' allegations of
Alexander's violence, that he owned a gun or had sexual desires for
young boys have been corroborated by witnesses or evidence. She has
acknowledged lying repeatedly but insists she is telling the truth now.
She
initially told authorities she had nothing to do with the killing then
blamed it on masked intruders. Two years after her arrest, she settled
on self-defense.
Arias has been testifying
over nearly six weeks during which she has described her abusive
childhood, cheating boyfriends, dead-end jobs, a raunchy sexual
relationship with the victim, and her contention that Alexander had
grown physically abusive in the months leading to his death, once even
choking her into unconsciousness.
Watch the trial while it's in session:
www.myfoxphoenix.com/category/234796/live-video2
Copyright 2013 The Associated Press modified.
Jodi Arias - 3/13/13
