No retrial for McStay family killer Charles Merritt, judge rules at sentencing
A hearing Friday, Jan. 17, for what was supposed to be the sentencing of Charles “Chase” Merritt for murdering a Fallbrook family of four in 2010, included many twists and even a request for retrial, before being continued to Tuesday.
Merritt, 62, was scheduled to learn his fate in San Bernardino Superior Court after a jury recommended a sentence of life without parole for the slaying of his former San Clemente business associate, Dana Hills High graduate Joseph McStay, 40, and death sentences for killing McStay’s wife, Summer, 43, and sons Gianni, 4, and Joseph Jr., 3. Prosecutors say the McStay family was bludgeoned to death shortly after McStay told Merritt he was being cut out of their water-feature business because of poor performance and suspicion of theft. Their skeletal remains were found three years later in the High Desert.
Merritt will now have to wait until Tuesday to be sentenced after a motion for a retrial took all day and was denied. Monday is a federal holiday, Martin Luther King Jr. Day.
Friday, there were oddities from the moment Judge Michael A. Smith took the bench about 10:15 a.m. until the court cleared about seven hours later.
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• Smith appeared to be taken aback that at 9:15 a.m., Merritt’s attorney, Rajan Maline, filed the motion for a new trial that included a 91-page brief on the cellphone tower evidence that prosecutors say placed Merritt near the gravesites in the San Bernardino County desert north of Victorville in the days after the McStays vanished on Feb. 4, 2010. Maline’s grounds for a new trial were insufficient evidence, prosecutorial misconduct and ineffective defense counsel.
• The ineffective defense gambit led Maline to grill his former co-counsel, James E. McGee, on the witness stand. Maline said that McGee, who withdrew from the case after the guilty verdicts, failed to challenge prosecution evidence by having the defense cellphone tower expert testify to errors in AT&T records. Maline launched into a highly technical explanation that Smith appeared to understand but had observers looking at each other quizzically.
• As the court broke for lunch, Merritt was seen having an animated conversation with Maline. When Smith retook the bench, Maline announced that Merritt wanted to fire him as his attorney, prompting gasps from a courtroom with about two dozen friends and family members of the Merritts and McStays. A hearing was called, and Merritt picked up a document folder and marched across the courtroom, escorted but unrestrained, joining Maline in Smith’s chambers for a hearing.
• Maline said prosecutors misrepresented evidence or “outright lied.” Responded Deputy District Attorney Britt Imes: “Once again the People are assailed with baseless claims of misconduct.”
• Smith then addressed the claim of insufficient evidence. “There’s no evidence linking Mr. Merritt to these murders,” Maline had argued. “None.” Smith promised not to go over every bit introduced over the course of the six-month trial. But Smith was thorough, and the gallery grew restless, with some people shifting in their seats and others taking brief breaks outside the courtroom. Smith eventually ruled that there was sufficient — though highly circumstantial — evidence beyond a reasonable doubt that Merritt was guilty.
Prosecutors said that Merritt’s cellphone was turned off during critical hours, and pings from it on Feb. 6, 2010, two days after the murder at the McStay home, put him in the area where the graves would be found years later. Further, prosecutors had argued, a high-tech analysis of a video from a surveillance camera proves that Merritt’s truck left the McStay home the night of the murders, and that Merritt’s activity with McStay’s QuickBooks shows he was looting it.
The judge pointed out that Merritt’s DNA had been found on the steering wheel and gear shift of McStays’ abandoned SUV near the Mexico border. Also, detectives noted that in an interview before the McStays had been found dead, Merritt referred to them in the past tense.
• At that moment, Smith ruled that there would be no new trial and the sentencing would go on. Maline declined to comment on the judge’s decision not to order a retrial. “We’re not done,” he said
Smith offered to send everyone home for the day, as the hour approached 5 p.m., but shouts from McStay family members convinced Smith to allow a victim-impact statement from Patrick McStay, Joseph’s father, who had flown in for the day.
“My son did nothing but help you and your family,” McStay said, addressing Merritt and the court. “What did you do for him?” McStay said his son paid the bills for Merritt’s family while Merritt was in jail in 2009. “How did you repay him? By killing him, his wife and his defenseless sons. A ruthless mass murderer. I hope you burn in hell. I will pray for your family and your children.”
Smith said he would consider a motion for a reduced sentence and hear more victim-impact statements on Tuesday. He can follow the jury’s sentencing recommendations or impose his own.
Even after court was out for the day, there was a surprise. Cathy Jarvis, who is Merritt’s ex-girlfriend and the mother of his children; and a sister, Juanita Merritt, said Maline had asked them not to speak to the media. But frustrated, they broke their silence.
Jarvis said she provided an alibi for Merritt. The night of Feb. 4, 2010, she said she saw an incoming call from Joseph McStay on Merritt’s phone while he was at her apartment in Rancho Cucamonga. She said that alibi was ignored “because it didn’t fit with the timeline (prosecutors) are trying to construct. I’m upset that this could happen in this day and age.”
Said Juanita Merritt: “There’s no way one man could have done this. My brother loved Joseph. There’s no way they could get in an argument that was so bad that Chase would murder him.”