Phil Spector's Murder Trial to Begin

By Jeralyn, Section Crime in the News
Posted on Mon Mar 19, 2007 at 12:01:57 AM EST
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Four years after the shooting death of actress Lana Clarkson at his Los Angeles home, record producer Phil Spector finally goes on trial for murder Monday morning.

His legal team includes New York lawyer Bruce Cutler, who previously represented John Gotti.

Clarkson was working as a hostess at the House of Blues on the Sunset Strip when she met Spector at the club and agreed to accompany him to his estate for a drink at 3 a.m., according to grand jury testimony.

Spector made conflicting statements that night, first telling his driver and police that he accidentally shot the woman and saying later that she took a revolver from him and committed suicide, court documents say. Spector pleaded not guilty.

As for the likely defense, no one seems quite sure.

"We don't know exactly what the defense is going to be, but there are lots of issues," says Laurie Levenson, a professor at Loyola Law School here. "Who pulled the trigger? What was Spector's mindset and mental state at the time? Did the gun malfunction? Was it human error?"

Bruce Cutler, argued unsuccessfully that Spector's declarations that he fired the gun should be withheld from the jury because Spector was suffering withdrawal symptoms from seven prescription drugs. Prosecution and defense scientists will give dueling testimony about how Clarkson died, court documents indicate.

Spector is now 66, and could get up to life in prison if convicted.

Police seized 11 guns from Spector's home. Fidler is allowing prosecutors to introduce testimony from four women who told the grand jury about separate incidents in which Spector pointed a gun and threatened them after they rejected his sexual advances. The women's stories are "probably the most devastating evidence against him," Levenson says.

But, he didn't shoot and kill the other fours, so why would he have killed Clarkson? I think that shows it may have been an accident.

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