A death-row inmate convicted of the murder of his girlfriend in Washington County did not receive a fair trial because his attorney abandoned -- in midtrial -- his client's main defense that he was innocent because of mental illness, his new attorney told the Arkansas Supreme Court on Thursday.
Lee Short told the court that Zachariah Marcyniuk's trial lawyer originally sought a defense of innocent by mental disease or defect. But the attorney later conceded that such a defense had no merit and threw his client's mental health experts "under the bus," Short said. The trial attorney instead argued that his client should be convicted of second-degree murder and receive a life sentence instead of the death penalty.
The jury did not go for the lesser charge and returned a guilty verdict for capital murder, leading Circuit Judge William Storey to sentence Marcyniuk to death.
Short said that while Marcyniuk had pleaded innocent and demanded a trial, his attorney was effectively entering a guilty plea for him with the court.
Unless the defendant agrees to do so, "you don't have a right to plead your client guilty, and that's exactly what happened here," Short said.
On March 12, 2008, Marcyniuk was charged with capital murder in the stabbing death three days earlier of his former girlfriend, Katharine "Katie" Wood, 24, of Greenbrier.
Prosecutors said Marcyniuk broke into Wood's apartment three weeks after she broke up with him and attacked her when she returned home. Wood was stabbed several times and her body was later found in her bathtub.
Witnesses for the defense and the state agreed that Marcyniuk suffered from borderline personality disorder, which the defense witness also argued made him unable to conform his behavior with the law at the time of the killing.
Borderline personality disorder is a mental illness associated with impulsiveness, unstable relationships and variable moods, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.
Marcyniuk, now 35, was convicted and sentenced to death in December 2008. He is being held at the Arkansas Department of Correction Varner Unit in Gould.
The Arkansas Supreme Court affirmed Marcyniuk's conviction and sentence in May 2010 and his attorneys pursued a new appeal arguing that his trial attorney was ineffective.
Marcyniuk's trial attorney, Fayetteville lawyer W.H. Taylor, testified at a post-conviction hearing in April 2012 that there was never any question that his client killed Wood. But Taylor said he argued throughout the trial that Marcyniuk was mentally ill and that to say he conceded that defense would be a "mischaracterization."
Assistant Attorney General Valerie Fortner told the court that Short's main argument -- that Marcyniuk didn't receive a fair trial because his attorney conceded the defense -- was never ruled on by the lower court, which generally prevents an appeals court from ruling on it.
Fortner said it was also "routine" to argue that lesser charges fit the crime and that it was Marcyniuk's attorney's strategy to ask the jury to consider finding his client guilty of second-degree murder.
"His goal was to save his client's life," Fortner said.
Metro on 05/23/2014
