Thursday, January 24, 2019
By Ed Runyan
WARREN
Claudia Hoerig dueled with Chris Becker, assistant Trumbull County prosecutor, during cross-examination Wednesday afternoon in her aggravated-murder trial, then sat and listened as one of her attorneys dueled with Becker and Prosecutor Dennis Watkins in closing arguments.
When it was over four hours later, jurors were dismissed for the day and asked to return at 9 a.m. today to receive jury instructions and begin to deliberate.
One of the jury instructions will be that the panel can consider two lesser charges than aggravated murder – murder and voluntary manslaughter, Becker said.
When Becker asked Claudia if it’s true that her actions March 12, 2007, the day her husband died, is the reason Karl is not able to testify in her trial, she replied, “Neither can my three children that he killed.”
She was referring to her claims she lost three pregnancies resulting from her marriage to Karl because he forced her to have abortions or caused her to lose the babies through abuse.
Becker asked again whether Karl “can come in and tell his side of the story,” but Claudia said, “Yes he can,” and explained she recorded “every day of my life for two years” because she wore a recording device on her wrist while she was married to Karl, and the recordings would tell what Karl would say.
She said she recorded everything because her first marriage had gone so badly. Then she complained the recordings were withheld from the trial against her will.
When Becker asked, she said she had recorded audio of her husband’s death, though she said she erased that recording in Brazil.
Claudia admitted killing her husband, but she has maintained she did not plan his killing. Premeditation is a requirement for her to be found guilty of aggravated murder.
Becker said one of the elements prosecutors needed to prove in order for Claudia to be convicted of aggravated murder was premeditation, known in legal terms as “prior calculation and design.”
He said jurors can consider the fact she fled back to her native Brazil after her husband’s death as “evidence of guilt.” She was in Brazil for nearly 11 years before the Brazilian government ordered her to be returned to the United States to stand trial.
Becker listed a series of remarks she made to law enforcement the night she was returned to the United States that called her believability into question.
For instance, she paid $228 for a laser sight for her handgun a couple days before Karl died. A laser sight shoots out a light beam that helps a shooter aim the gun at a target.
Holding his hand up to his head as if he was holding a gun to his own head, Becker asked, “Do you need a laser sight to do this? Using your reason and common sense, does that make any sense what she said?”
Becker pointed out Claudia went to a target-practice range in Warren two days before she killed her husband even though she claimed she bought the gun only so she could use it to commit suicide.
“You target practice to commit suicide?” he asked. “Using your reason and common sense, does that make any sense to you? You need that laser sight to commit suicide?”
Defense attorney John Cornely, in his summation, said the reason his client went to the shooting range was because she wanted to practice shooting because she was concerned about “recoil,” which is when a gun moves as a result of being fired, sometimes causing the shooter to miss their target.
Claudia testified she killed Karl because he would not accept her pregnancy the day he died and told her he was going to adopt his daughter’s baby and raise the child.
“Heck yeah, she was hurt,” Cornely said. Karl locked the door and took a shower for an hour, she said. Claudia, who had tried to commit suicide a month earlier, drank a half a bottle of rum, she testified.
“When you are dealing with an emotional crisis of the magnitude she was dealing with, you don’t do rational things,” Cornely said.
Longtime Prosecutor Dennis Watkins gave the final closing argument, arguing that Claudia’s account of the final moments before Karl died is false.
She said she was holding her gun to her head when Karl came out of the bathroom and threatening to kill herself. Karl told her to go ahead and do it but not upstairs because she would get blood on his paintings.
She testified the comment angered her, so she shot him as he started to descend the 10 steps to the first floor. She said he died after the first shot and dropped down the remainder of the stairs.
But, Watkins said, Karl, a major in the Air Force Reserves, would not have turned his back away and walked down the stairs with her holding a gun. “He is going to disarm her,” Watkins said.
The forensic evidence indicated there was no blood on the steps, and Karl was shot through the head from close range.
The forensics point to Karl being killed in an “ambush,” Watkins said. “It has been a crooked puzzle that she has portrayed,” Watkins said of Claudia. “The pieces don’t fit. It’s crooked because she could not tell you the truth.”
What does fit is that “she had a plan to kill him when he came home” that day, Watkins said.
The trial was scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. Wednesday but was delayed until 1 p.m. after Claudia was taken to the hospital at 8:15 a.m. for a heart-related issue.