Brian David Mitchell will face charges of kidnapping within the Smart case after years of avoiding them. More than eight years after 14 year-old Smart vanished from her family’s home in Salt Lake City, jury selection for Mitchell’s trial started Monday. Mitchell’s lawyers are planning an insanity defense in a trial where Mitchell’s wife, already convicted of the kidnapping, could testify against her husband.
What took place when Smart had been kidnapped
Elizabeth Smart was kidnapped on June 5, 2002. The teenager’s abduction and eventual rescue had been a never-ending news story and her parents became media fixtures as they repeatedly pleaded for her safe return. The drifter who had worked at the Smart residence at one point, Mitchell and his wife, Wanda Ileen Barzee, were found with her nine months later just 18 miles from her home. Mitchell, who believed he was a prophet named “Emmanuel,” was charged along with his wife with kidnapping, sexual assault and burglary. But the couple was ruled incompetent to stand trial by a Utah district court judge in July 2005.
The brand new circumstance for Elizabeth Smart
Elizabeth Smart's case brought on a TV movie and book to be made about it. This caused Mitchell and Barzee to be ruled competent to withstand court again in 2008. In Nov 2009 Barzee pleaded guilty to kidnapping and unlawful transportation of a minor. She had been sent straight to prison. She will remain there for 15 years. Barzee said she'd cooperate in state and federal cases against Mitchell in a plea agreement. In Dec 2009 a nurse observing Mitchell in a psychiatric ward said he was faking insane behavior to avoid prosecution. In March 2010 U.S. District Judge Dale Kimball declared Mitchell a “misleading psychopath” and ordered him to stand trial.
The Mitchell trial
22 year old Elizabeth Smart testified. This took place at a Mitchell competency listening to they had. She said that through the nine months she had been held by Mitchell, he sexually assaulted her many times while also taking her at knife point from her room. The next thing Mitchell's attorney's did had been say that there wouldn't be any impartial jurors to do the case since there had been so much media coverage of the account in 2002. 35 potential jurors followed Mitchell into the federal courthouse in Salt Lake City Monday when he was dressed as a prisoner instead of a patient.
Citations
Washington Post
washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/22/AR2010102202949.html
CNN
cnn.com/2010/CRIME/10/31/utah.elizabeth.smart.trial/index.html?npt=NP1
Salt Lake Tribune
sltrib.com/sltrib/home/50581578-76/mitchell-juror-jury-case.html.csp
Wikipedia
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_Smart_kidnapping
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