Judge gives jury options in trial of teen accused of killing parents
By Emanuella Grinberg
Court TV
BOISE, Idaho (Court TV) -- If jurors are not convinced an Idaho teen murdered her parents, they will have the option of deciding whether she assisted the killer, a judge ruled Friday.
Prosecutors have charged Sarah Johnson, 18, with two counts of first-degree murder in the Sept. 2, 2003, shooting deaths of her parents, Diane and Alan Johnson.
At the state's request, Judge Barry Wood also added the lesser-included charge of aiding and abetting the murders during a hearing Friday at the Ada County Courthouse.
The 12 jurors and six alternates are expected to begin deliberations Monday.
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Wood rejected a defense motion to drop the option of second-degree murder charges, a decision that reduced the defendant to tears.
Sarah Johnson, who donned her signature pink shirt for the hearing, faces up to life in prison if convicted of shooting her parents at close range when she was 16 because, prosecutors claim, they forbade her to date a 19-year-old undocumented Mexican immigrant.
"The evidence here clearly supports an aiding and abetting instruction," Wood said.
The judge even identified each piece of evidence he said could lead the jury to "reasonably infer" that if Sarah Johnson did not murder her parents, she could have assisted the killer.
The defense argued strenuously that there was no basis for its inclusion.
"After one month and a half of telling the jury that Sarah was the person who pulled the trigger, now they're saying someone else did it," defense attorney Bob Pangburn told Courttv.com outside of court.
"It's indicative of how desperate they are," he said. "They promised that jury they would prove Sarah pulled the trigger, and now that the evidence hasn't shown that, they want to add an aiding and abetting instruction."
The state argued there were enough questions surrounding access to items at the crime scene to serve as evidence that the defendant assisted someone else.
"Someone had to have intimate knowledge of the house and where the guns, knives and robe were kept," Scott Birch, an investigator with the Idaho State Attorney General's office, said outside of court.
Crime scene evidence
Blaine County prosecutors called 79 witnesses over three weeks of testimony to support their theory that Sarah Johnson was the only person with the motive, opportunity and access to kill her parents.
Several friends and family members, including the defendant's 24-year-old brother, testified Sarah Johnson had a rocky relationship with her parents, especially her mother, that was further spiked by her relationship with Bruno Santos, whom her parents thought was taking advantage of their daughter.
Then, three days before the shooting, Alan Johnson found Sarah at her boyfriend's home and threatened to press charges against him, Santos testified.
The defense reiterated the phrase "no blood, no guilt," arguing that no blood or DNA from the Johnsons was found on the defendant, nor could investigators link her own blood or DNA to the murder weapon or crime scene.
The defense claimed whoever shot Alan Johnson in the chest and Diane Johnson in the head with the high-velocity weapon would have been unable to avoid a "rain of blood."
They also highlighted the existence of unknown male DNA on the murder weapon, the leather glove and the pink robe.
Judge Wood cited the possibility of an unknown shooter when he announced he was adding the aiding and abetting instruction.
"All that evidence clearly supports the theory that if Sarah Johnson didn't do it, she certainly assisted and facilitated it by way of access to items," Wood said.
He addressed issues arising from the guesthouse, the source of the murder weapon and ammunition, noting that "access to the guesthouse is limited and there was no evidence of forced entry."
As for the murder weapon, he noted, "for all purposes, there was obscured access to the gun," referring to the fact that the owner of the gun who was renting the guesthouse kept it in his closet, buried under clothes.
Wood also pointed out Sarah Johnson's pink robe, which her uncle, Jim Vavold, testified was hanging in her bathroom two nights before the shootings.
"I don't know who was wearing the robe, but if she wasn't wearing it and someone else was ... [that person] put it in the garbage with her," he said.
Pangburn said although his client was upset by the ruling, he would assure her that the evidence did not support an aiding and abetting conviction.
"This jury is going to follow the evidence," he said. "We're not going to get, 'Well, she must have helped if she didn't do it herself.'"
