MAHONING COUNTY Jury acquits man of manslaughter in mother's death

By BOB JACKSON
VINDICATOR COURTHOUSE REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- It took a jury only about two hours today to decided that Mark E. Hubbard did not cause his mother to suffer a fatal heart attack in their Austintown apartment.
The jury in Mahoning County Common Pleas Court acquitted Hubbard, 36, of involuntary manslaughter in the death of his mother, Elinore Hubbard, 65. The jury also cleared him of three counts of domestic violence.
Visiting Judge Charles J. Bannon presided over the case.
"I think it's a sin that this case got as far as it did, and this guy had to risk five years in prison," said defense attorney Mark Lavelle.
Testimony about fight
Lavelle said the jury believed Hubbard's testimony Thursday that he did not attack his sister and spark a brawl that led to their mother's fatal attack.
Hubbard testified that when he heard his angry sister rattling through a kitchen drawer during an argument, he knew he had to leave or fight.
He didn't have time to undo the four locks that secured the front door of their apartment, so he decided to fight.
When his sister, Cherilyn Chandler, came into the living room with a serrated knife, he grabbed her wrist and tried to wrest it away from her.
"I wasn't gentle," he said. "I put some force on it. I tried to twist her arm off."
He said that was the extent of his confrontation with his sister. He denied ever punching or kicking her and said he didn't put the knife to her throat once he got it out of her hand.
Prosecutors say he did those things and caused Elinore Hubbard to suffer a fatal heart attack in February.
Hubbard told jurors he and his sister hadn't gotten along for years. He said Chandler was angry that he had moved into the Austintown apartment she shared with her mother and daughter.
Hubbard said he was staying at the apartment only until he could get himself checked into a drug rehabilitation center.
Hubbard said he grew tired of his sister's taunts, and he felt that she was lying to him when she said their mother wanted him out of the apartment.
When Chandler told Hubbard on Feb. 7 that she would call the police to remove him if he didn't leave the apartment on his own, he said he decided to get her back.
Defendant's plan
Hubbard said he told his sister that he would report her to authorities for driving illegally. He said his plan was to goad her into getting angry.
"That's when she got mad and she said, 'I'll fix you,'" Hubbard told jurors. He said that's when Chandler went to the kitchen and came back with the knife.
Elinore Hubbard had been released from a hospital one day earlier, with orders to rest and to avoid stress or physical activity. Prosecutors say the stress of trying to break up the fight between the siblings caused her to have the heart attack.