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May 8, 2008 8:15 am US/Mountain
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Jury To Decide On Death Penalty In Murder Trial
CENTENNIAL, Colo. (CBS4) ―
Closing arguments are set to start Thursday in the death penalty trial of Sir Mario Owens in Arapahoe County District Court. Owens is accused of killing a key witness in another murder case.
The trial has been under a gag order and extra security was assigned because of the publicity surrounding the trial.
Owens is already serving a life sentence after his conviction in the other murder case.
Javad Marshall-Fields was supposed to testify in that case.
He and his fiancée, Vivian Wolfe, were shot and killed in their care in June of 2005 at an intersection in Aurora.
Legal experts said killing a witness is considered an aggravating factor when trying to impose the death penalty. The jury will have to decide on a murder conviction and the death penalty for it to be imposed.
"It's not just beyond a reasonable doubt anymore, in terms of the actual guilt or innocence, it's beyond all doubt," said Karen Steinhauser, adjunct professor of law at the University of Denver.
Steinhauser, a former prosecutor, said don't expect the death penalty to be executed any time soon if the jury votes for that sentence.
"The attorneys who are seeking to have a sentence of death overturned are going to most likely go to every possible court," said Steinhauser.
If sentenced to death, Owens would be one of two people on Colorado's Death Row.
Nathan Dunlap is currently the only inmate there. He was sentenced to death in 1996 for the Chuck E. Cheese killings in Aurora in 1993.
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