Kraft Loses Bid to Block 8 Murders From Trial

Lawyers for Randy Steven Kraft failed Thursday in their bid to keep evidence of eight more murders out of the penalty phase of his trial, but said they wouldn’t debate most of the facts of those killings.

“We’re hoping these murders can be presented as expeditiously as possible so that we can get on with what I consider the real issues of a penalty phase, the character and background (of Kraft),” defense attorney James G. Merwin told the judge.

Kraft, 44, convicted in Santa Ana last month of 16 Orange County murders, could be the most prolific serial killer in the country’s history, prosecutors contend. They have linked Kraft in court papers to a total of 45 sex-related murders of young men. But Deputy Dist. Atty. Bryan F. Brown has decided to present evidence of only eight additional killings when he asks jurors for a death verdict at the next phase of the trial, which is scheduled to begin Monday. Those murders occurred in Oregon and Michigan.

Kraft’s lawyers half-kiddingly have thanked Brown for paring down the numbers to shorten the next trial phase. But any new murders at all are too much, they argue.

“If this were football, Brown would be assessed a 15-yard penalty for piling on,” Merwin said.

Superior Court Judge Donald A. McCartin, at a non-jury hearing Thursday, rejected several motions by the defense to keep the Oregon and Michigan murders out of the next phase of the trial.

In that phase, the jurors will decide only between verdicts of death or life in prison without parole. A judge can reduce a death verdict but cannot upgrade a life without parole verdict to death. In Orange County, no judge has set aside a jury’s death verdict since the new death law was first instituted 12 years ago.

Dilemma for Defense

Kraft’s lawyers say the new murders in the penalty phase present a dilemma for Kraft’s defense.

“The focus of the penalty phase should be the proper penalty for the 16 murders in the conviction, not another trial on whether he is guilty of killing eight more,” Kraft attorney William J. Kopeny said.

While Kraft lawyer Merwin was not conceding that Kraft killed the victims in Oregon and Michigan, he said the defense will not contest many of the facts.

“The jury already thinks he killed 16 people, and we have to concentrate on that,” Merwin said.

In fact, the defense’s only real victory in a full day of motions Thursday was to persuade the prosecution to stipulate to some of the more technical testimony, to prevent bringing in several out-of-state witnesses. Merwin also wants Brown to agree not to put on families of the victims in Oregon and Michigan. That issue is one of many which will be addressed when the hearings continue today.

Judge McCartin has warned the attorneys that he will not allow these non-jury hearings to interrupt the beginning of testimony on Monday. He threatened to hold a court session Saturday if the defense motions are not wrapped up today.

Kraft, a computer expert, was on business in northern Oregon and in Grand Rapids, Mich., for the Santa Monica-based Lear Siegler Inc. at the times when all eight of those young men were killed between 1980 and 1982. Most of the victims in the Kraft case were either emasculated, mutilated, or in some way sexually assaulted.