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The Nation - News from Jan. 20, 1989

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Attorneys for accused child killer Joel Steinberg concluded their case by blaming his lover for the death of the child they raised, claiming Hedda Nussbaum killed the little girl in a jealous rage. Steinberg’s lawyers steered clear of a possible last-minute insanity defense--despite indications they might use one--and instead revealed to the jury for the first time in the 12-week murder trial what their client maintains happened the night Lisa Steinberg, the 6-year-old girl he and Nussbaum raised but never adopted, was battered into a fatal coma. “Hedda caused the injury to Lisa. She did it herself in a fight,” attorney Ira London said during the five-hour defense summation in state Supreme Court in Manhattan.

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