FSU crim law prof murdered in his home. Guess view on death pena - http://xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=2623321&forum_id=2

Swiped right on FSU law prof wife, just matched. Received msg in minutes - http://xoxohth.com/thread.php?thread_id=3884370&forum_id=2

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38965447)

i've met hundreds of shitbags like her from aventura through jupiter beach.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38961858)

On re-trial can they try to bring in CA too? Or would she necessarily be tried alone?

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38962471)

The thought that if they find both guilty the kids will have two parents in jail, possibly for life, possible one will be executed. And they probably feel like KM wasn't a hardened criminal like SG and LR but just got in over her head and desperate.

It's not how I would find but it seems to me that's what they're working through.

I will guess a guilty verdict and a compromise verdict on KM

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38962519)

But the prior state attorney refused to try them based mostly on the evidence that we just heard.

If they convict both they will cut a deal with KM to testify against CA and DM, is my thought.

If they convict SG but acquit KM they need to cut a deal with SG which is possible but not as certain and not as strong.

If they convict KM on a compromise charge we'll see how she feels about her freedom vs. keeping the street code.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38962543)

They have a lot, and I mean a lot, to tie SG and LR to Tallahassee in the time Markel was killed. There's a flurry of contact between the accused conspirators in the 24 hours prior to Markel's death, then about 90 minutes later (SG had turned his cell phone off when Markel left the gym, then turned in back on about 90 minutes later) there is a flurry of activity which begins with SG calling KM, then KM immediately calling CA.

The cell phone pings of that call show a location of SG consistent with having been on the highway headed toward Miami from Tallahassee for about 90 minutes.

So to me there's really no alleging that SG and LR weren't involved. All SG can do is pin it on LR. All KM can do is plead ignorance.

SG is alleging that LR was the triggerman and acted alone in the sense that SG was told to come along, and LR's testimony should be ignored completely because of the plea deal he cut. But the problem with this is that, if you don't accept the murder-for-hire theory, LR has zero motive to drive 500 miles to go kill a law professor that he has never met.

KM's defense is that SG acted without the knowledge of KM out of jealousy toward CA, saying that if I take care of this 'problem up north,' you agree to stop seeing KM. I mean this is just a ridiculous theory but it's what they argued.

Again, I would convict. But you never know with juries.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38962606)

if sg and ca didn't hate each other and fuck around with the call to his dad's office...and they needed to get rid of Kady the weak link.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38962934)

and them calling the dentist and trying to up the adelsons

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38962850)

another jury question

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963423)

reached verdict on one count on second defendant

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963427)

guilty 1st degree murder

guilty conspiracy murder

not guilty third count

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963450)

And hung on lower charges

Some want to compromise and possibly one wants to acquit entirely

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963469)

State wouldn't try the Adelsons without direct testimony, which SG and KM control.

DP is now on the table for SG. Will that be enough to get SG or KM to cooperate?

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963495)

*desperately tries to recall password on autoadmit*

*wonders what i'm doing in a Christian heaven*

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963541)

Sigfredo needs to flip on her

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963641)

somehow apparently some birdbrain female juror (speculation) figured out somehow charlie adelson hired sigfredo garcia (ex of his fuckmate, who hates him, and never spoke to ever by phone) to kill his sister's ex-husband and the girl in the middle did nothing.

Charlie visited sigfredo in his ferrari. "hey im the millionaire fucking your babymama. she doesnt know im here, but will you kill my ex BIL, and by the way Ill suddenly gush cash to your babymama though she's not involved here"

hope Katie is frightened of a new trial, not emboldened, and cops plea. her testimony against charlie is fucked now, though.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963668)

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963705)

41m

If the jury hangs as to Katherine Magbanua after further deliberation, she should be retried; I believe the state proved its case against Katie Magbanua, but it's certainly true that a clearer case could have been made. #DanMarkel

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963727)

Big doubt was raised by explanation that the murder payoff cash was cash she got from being bottle girl at fancy clubs. No investigator even bothered to look into this. That can be fixed

Next trial if I were the state I would *not* play the phone calls that followed the bump. Merely introduce how many there were, dates and times. It looks incriminating that an explosion of calls followed, but she behaved well on the calls. If the defense wants to play them, let them risk it. (She did use some code on the calls. It'd be a risk).

Bring more wits from dentistry to say they never saw her work there. She wiggled around saying "I worked weekends, I worked from home," etc. A multi-million dollar dental practice will have more records and wits about who the fuck is on payroll

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963820)

To lean the other direction, she used silly code about the phone number, which indicates guilt....

But anyway, the state effectively failed to convict her. If I were tasked with examining why, Id reconsider using the calls. Sounds better just to say there were 74 calls or whatever

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963848)

AS: Yes, Donna immediately called and met with Charlie.

What happened then?

AS: Charlie immediately called Katie.

Just once?

AS: He called her 43 times. In the same 5 day period just before the bump, he called her zero times. Matter of fact, he only called her 6 times the preceding three months.

What did Katie do?

AS: She immediately called Sigfredo. She called him 13 times in two days. He called her 5 times those same days. Then Katie called Charlie 27 times. Finally, Charlie called the bump number.

Presto.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963932)

As expected (see my prior tweets); on appeal, expect Sigfredo Garcia to challenge Judge Hankinson's decision not to have separate trials. (As I tweeted earlier, I do think Katie Magbanua taking the stand helped her - and hurt Garcia - a lot.)

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963910)

there was stuff to work with on garcia that didnt really get emphasized:

1. plan was rivera would be shooter?

2. rivera would get 35k for this?

3. plan somehow just switched?

4. rivera still got his 35k and more on top? wtf?

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963946)

Questions like this reflect why many states have moved away from defining *accomplice* liability through the term *principal.* #KatieMagbanua is charged as an accomplice to the death of #DanMarkel--not a principal--but the FL statute obscures that clarity.

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38963984)

Man Convicted in Murder of Law Professor Locked in Family Feud

A jury found Sigfredo Garcia guilty of first-degree murder in the 2014 killing of Dan Markel.

ImageSigfredo Garcia faces the death penalty after being found guilty of first-degree murder in the shooting of a prominent law professor.

Sigfredo Garcia faces the death penalty after being found guilty of first-degree murder in the shooting of a prominent law professor.CreditCreditAlicia Devine/Tallahassee Democrat, via Associated Press

Patricia Mazzei

By Patricia Mazzei

Oct. 11, 2019Updated 7:37 p.m. ET

MIAMI — The killing shook Florida’s capital and stunned the international legal community: A prominent law professor locked in a rancorous battle with his ex-wife and in-laws was gunned down in his garage, in what prosecutors depicted as a murder-for-hire plot.

State prosecutors charged three people with the murder of the professor, Dan Markel, hoping to pressure them into revealing whoever may have financed the murder.

Two of the accused, Sigfredo Garcia and Katherine Magbanua, maintained their innocence and went to trial late last month, five years after the professor’s death. Over 11 days, the case played out inside a courtroom in Tallahassee, the state capital, revealing a web of tumultuous relationships around Mr. Markel’s murder.

On Friday, a jury found Mr. Garcia, 37, guilty of first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder, and not guilty of solicitation of murder. He faces the death penalty, and sentencing will begin on Monday.

After more than 11 hours of deliberation, jurors told Judge James C. Hankinson that they were unable to reach a verdict on the same charges against Ms. Magbanua, 35. Judge Hankinson declared a mistrial.

The other man charged with the murder, Luis Rivera, a close friend of Mr. Garcia and a former leader of the North Miami Latin Kings gang, cooperated with law enforcement. In exchange for testifying against Mr. Garcia and Ms. Magbanua, Mr. Rivera, 36, was allowed to plead guilty to second-degree murder and avoid the death penalty. He received a 19-year sentence instead, and is concurrently serving a 12-year sentence in an unrelated federal racketeering case.

After a contentious divorce in 2013, Mr. Markel, 41, a professor at the Florida State University College of Law who had helped build a network of online legal scholarship, and his ex-wife, Wendi Adelson, were given joint custody of their two young sons.

Prosecutors argued that Mr. Markel was murdered because a court order prevented Ms. Adelson from relocating to South Florida with the children. They said her brother and mother then got involved, and arranged for Ms. Magbanua, Mr. Garcia and Mr. Rivera to carry out the murder for $100,000.

“What enemy or enemies had Mr. Markel made that set into motion such a brutal act?” Georgia Cappleman, the lead prosecutor in the case, asked during closing arguments on Thursday. “The answer: his own family.”

Mr. Markel was shot twice in the head on the morning of July 18, 2014, shortly after he pulled his car into the garage — his keys were still in the ignition. A neighbor thought he heard a gunshot and saw a light-colored Toyota Prius drive away.

From cellphone records and surveillance footage, investigators determined that a light green Prius had followed Mr. Markel the morning he was killed. They found that Mr. Rivera had rented the Prius in Miami. On the rental contract, Mr. Rivera listed cellphone numbers for himself and Mr. Garcia, his best friend since childhood.

Toll transponder data showed the Prius making the 450-mile-plus trip from Miami to Tallahassee and returning after the murder. That night, the men stopped at a drive-through A.T.M. in South Florida, where they were photographed with Mr. Rivera behind the wheel and Mr. Garcia in the passenger seat.

Finding Mr. Rivera and then Mr. Garcia led investigators to Ms. Magbanua, with whom Mr. Garcia has two children and an on-again-off-again relationship. At the time of the murder, the couple was broken up, and Ms. Magbanua was dating Charles Adelson, Ms. Adelson’s brother and Mr. Markel’s former brother-in-law.

Ms. Magbanua did part-time clerical work at a Miami Beach dental office where she met Mr. Adelson, 42, a periodontist.

Her finances improved considerably after Mr. Markel’s murder. Bank records showed she began receiving regular checks from a different dental practice, owned by Mr. Adelson’s parents in Broward County. The checks were handwritten and signed by Mr. Adelson’s mother, Donna Adelson.

Two assistants who worked at the practice testified that they did not know Ms. Magbanua to be an employee. A few months after the murder, Ms. Magbanua paid a plastic surgeon $4,000 in cash for breast implant surgery.

In April 2016, police tapped the cellphones of Mr. Garcia, Ms. Magbanua, Charles Adelson and Donna Adelson. To get them to talk to one another, an undercover F.B.I. agent posed as a member of the Latin Kings gang and asked Donna Adelson for more compensation for the family of Mr. Rivera, who was in prison. Mr. Garcia was arrested the following month, and Ms. Magbanua some months later.

None of the Adelsons have been charged. For years, as Mr. Markel’s sensational murder has been dissected in news articles, blog posts, a popular true-crime podcast and episodes of “Dateline” and “20/20,” lawyers for the Adelsons have maintained their innocence.

Donna Adelson, 69, had figured prominently in her daughter’s divorce. About a year before the murder, she suggested that her daughter pretend the couple’s sons had converted to Catholicism — Mr. Markel was an observant Jew — to pressure Mr. Markel to agree to the children’s relocation. Donna Adelson also floated offering Mr. Markel $1 million to allow the move.

The day of the shooting, the police brought in Wendi Adelson, 40, a former clinical law professor at Florida State, to tell her what had happened to her ex-husband. She cried and buried her face in her hands, according to police video of the interview. She also mentioned that her brother, after buying her a television as a divorce present, had joked, “I looked into a hiring a hit man and it was cheaper to get you this TV.”

“But he would never,” Ms. Adelson added. “It’s such a horrible thing to say.”

Wendi Adelson testified at the trial that she had no knowledge of the murder. She moved her sons to South Florida a few days after Mr. Markel was killed.

Ms. Magbanua took the rare step of testifying in her own defense. She said she began receiving the checks from the Adelsons after she asked Charles Adelson to hire her as his assistant — a favor so she could qualify for state health insurance for her children. The money for her surgery, she added, had been saved up from cash tips she made working in nightclubs.

Ms. Magbanua denied any part in the murder but said she believed that Mr. Adelson was involved. Her defense lawyers suggested that Mr. Garcia, the father of her children, agreed to kill Mr. Markel in exchange for Mr. Adelson to stop dating her. Mr. Garcia briefly confronted Mr. Adelson 17 days before the murder.

“The only thing she’s guilty of is terrible taste in men,” Tara Kawass, one of Ms. Magbanua’s lawyers, said during opening arguments.

Mr. Rivera testified that Ms. Magbanua had served as the conduit for the murder plot, and that Mr. Garcia had pulled the trigger.

Mr. Garcia’s defense posited a different theory: that Mr. Rivera must have been the shooter because Mr. Garcia disliked Mr. Adelson too much to kill someone for him. Saam Zangeneh, Mr. Garcia’s lawyer, argued that Mr. Adelson had bought drugs from Mr. Rivera and hired him directly to commit the murder.

“I don’t think that you can believe anything that he says out of his mouth,” Mr. Zangeneh told jurors of Mr. Rivera. “Do you think he would have gotten the deal that he got if he admitted to being the shooter?”

Investigators found no direct link between Mr. Adelson and either Mr. Rivera or Mr. Garcia. David Oscar Markus, a lawyer for Charles Adelson, said the mistrial against Ms. Magbanua showed why prosecutors have never charged the Adelson family.

“The case simply isn’t there,” Mr. Markus said in a statement. “Professional prosecutors rightfully understood that they couldn’t prove a case against Charlie before this trial. After the hung jury, their prospects have gone down, not up.”

Lawyers for Mr. Markel’s parents said they expect a new trial against Ms. Magbanua.

“After waiting five long years, we are relieved that at least one of the people responsible for Danny’s murder was convicted today,” their statement said. “Yet justice was only partially served.”

Patricia Mazzei is the Miami bureau chief, covering Florida and Puerto Rico. Before joining The Times, she was the political writer for The Miami Herald. She was born and raised in Venezuela, and is bilingual in Spanish. @PatriciaMazzei • Facebook

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38965441)

Wtf

(http://www.autoadmit.com/thread.php?thread_id=4361238&forum_id=2#38965531)