Michael Griffin Slaying

Madison County jury rejects mental illness defense in convicting Samuel Miles ...

HUNTSVILLE, Alabama -- Jurors deliberated for about two hours Wednesday before convicting Samuel Miles of capital murder for the January 2009 slaying of his neighbor, Linda Keller.

The jury rejected the defense argument that the mentally troubled Miles, 61, was legally insane and should be found not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect.

Prosecutors did not seek the death penalty and after the verdict was read Circuit Judge Alan Mann sentenced Miles to life in prison without parole.

A large crowd of Keller's friends and family, including her son, greeted the verdict with relief, hugging and wiping away tears.

The relief followed a crime that even the defense argued made no sense. Miles told police and doctors who interviewed him that Keller's use of a white trash bag and white rag to clean her truck meant that she thought his family was white trash.

It also meant she was threatening his family, Miles said. Miles lived alone but has a married son in New Orleans.

Keller was killed in her Fieldstone Court home off Bailey Cove Road in south Huntsville early on Jan. 13, 2009, after Miles allegedly broke through her bedroom window. On a 911 call shortly after the shooting, Miles told the dispatcher he shot Keller five times with a shogun.

In an impassioned argument for Miles' conviction, Madison County District Attorney Rob Broussard said mental health professionals do some good work in the clinical setting, but he directed scorn at the idea that someone practicing psychology or psychiatry could confidently describe what was going on in Miles' head.

After the verdict Broussard said he was pleased the jury was able to clearly see the major issue in the case: that Keller suffered a violent death caused by Miles.

"In my experience, mental health defense cases are always challenging," Broussard said. "The subject matter is a murky, unscientific world. The mental health professionals always try to explain human behavior in scientific terms, and in most cases that is impossible.

Murder trial in IU prof's slaying gets under way

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. (AP) - Prosecutors and attorneys for a man accused of stabbing to death an Indiana University professor are giving jurors opposing views of a sexual encounter that allegedly occurred between the men two days before the killing.

In the opening day of Michael Griffin's murder trial in Don Belton's December 2009 killing, prosecutors argued Tuesday that the men engaged in consensual sex.

But The Herald-Times reports that Griffin's attorneys say Belton, who was gay, sexually assaulted their client after a Christmas dinner party when Griffin was too drunk to know what was happening.

Both sides agree that Griffin went to Belton's home and killed him with a 10-inch military knife on Dec. 27, 2009. But while prosecutors maintain Griffin intended to kill the 53-year-old assistant English professor, defense attorney David Collins argues that Griffin was carried away in the heat of an argument when he confronted Belton about the encounter. They argued the crime was voluntary manslaughter, not murder, The Herald-Times reported.

Griffin's girlfriend, Jessa Greiwe, testified she passed out on a bed with Griffin after a day of heavy drinking and woke twice to find Belton performing sex acts on the 26-year-old Griffin.

She said she and Griffin felt violated, shocked and confused. Belton "overstepped every boundary imaginable," Greiwe said.

Deputy prosecutor Darcie Winkle saw things differently.

"They engaged in group sex, then a day and a half later the defendant goes to Don Belton's house," Winkle said. "The defendant did some things that night that he wished he hadn't. He cornered him in the kitchen and stabbed him repeatedly."

Griffin told police he stabbed Belton after Belton failed to "show or express any type of feeling that what had taken place was a mistake," court documents said.

Greiwe said Griffin told her he had killed Belton while she thought he was out running errands. She said she had been concerned that he might go to Belton's house.

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