Longo murder case to go to jury

NEWPORT, Ore. — The murder trial of Christian Longo, who admitted killing his wife and child and is accused of killing his two other children, is expected to go to a jury today.

His trial began March 10. If he is convicted, the state will seek the death penalty.

In closing arguments last Thursday, prosecutors said lying is second nature for Longo and ridiculed his version of events of Dec. 17, 2001, when they say the family was killed.

Oregon courthouses are closed Friday because of budget cuts, so the trial was delayed until today.

Longo testified that he strangled his wife, MaryJane, in a fit of rage after she killed the couple's two older children and severely injured the youngest.

He said he then killed the youngest, 2-year-old Madison, when he realized she was still breathing.

"Basically, he's killed his wife without knowing where his children are. That is the story he's pitching to you," prosecutor Paulette Sanders said in closing arguments.

"He has just strangled his wife with his bare hands, and his little girl, his last surviving child he knows of. He goes for coffee," Sanders said.

"He lied and lied repeatedly — to his wife, to his parents, to the elders of his church, to his old friends, to his new friends here in Newport. He lied to the police. Now he's lying to you," Sanders said.

Sanders discounted Longo's claim that MaryJane threw her children into Lint Slough in Waldport from a highway bridge, while they were still alive, wrapped in comforters with rocks in pillow cases around their ankles.

Sanders described Longo, 29, as a cold-hearted man with a taste for fine wine and cars the family could not afford, one who killed his family so he could enjoy a more uninhibited lifestyle.

All four bodies were found stuffed in suitcases and comforters and dumped in bays in Waldport and Newport.

Longo fled to Mexico, where an FBI agent caught him three weeks later at a beach resort in Tulum. Longo had partied and snorkeled and was engaged in a romantic tryst with a German tourist.

Longo's court-appointed attorney Steven Krasik told jurors he understood if they didn't believe his client, an admitted con man and murderer. But Krasik said that police overlooked evidence that may have confirmed Longo's story and that reasonable doubt exists.