PHOENIX – A new jury could be impaneled to decide sometime in late September whether Jodi Arias should be sentenced to death or life in prison for killing her boyfriend, a judge said Tuesday.
Attorneys have continued to file motions and kept mum on any talk of a deal to resolve the highly publicized case without another trial.
Arias was convicted of first-degree murder May 8 in the stabbing and shooting death of boyfriend Travis Alexander in his suburban Phoenix home. About two weeks later, the same jury failed to reach a unanimous decision on her sentence.
The trial captured headlines worldwide with lurid tales of sex, betrayal and a bloody killing. Arias, 33, admitted she killed Alexander, but claimed it was self-defence after he attacked her. Prosecutors argued it was premeditated murder carried out in a jealous rage after the victim wanted to end their affair and planned a trip to Mexico with another woman.
The case is now in limbo as prosecutors decide whether to pursue the death penalty again with a new jury – or simply take the death penalty off the table, a move that would either see Arias spend the rest of her life behind bars or be eligible for release after 25 years. That decision would be up to the judge.
Meanwhile, her attorneys are seeking to have vacated the jury’s determination that Arias killed her one-time lover in an “especially cruel” manner. That finding meant that Arias was eligible for the death penalty.
Arias’ attorneys argue that the definition of “especially cruel” is too vague for jurors with no legal experience to determine what makes one killing more cruel or heinous than another.
Judge Sherry Stephens gave defence attorneys until Aug. 5 to file final motions supporting their arguments. She set another status conference in the case for Aug. 26 and noted she would like to set a retrial date for late September.
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