Jury Deadlocks in Wrongful Death Case Against Deputy : Trial: Unanimous verdict was needed in federal trial on $10-million lawsuit. Defendant admitted having sex with Van Nuys woman but denied killing her.

A federal court jury was unable to reach a verdict Thursday in a $10-million wrongful death case in which an off-duty Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputy was accused of killing a 26-year-old Van Nuys woman after a night of heavy drinking and sex.

The four-man, four-woman jury would have needed to reach a unanimous verdict to hold Robert Mallon responsible for the death of Catherine Braley seven years ago.

But after deliberating for three days, the jurors told U.S. District Judge Mariana R. Pfaelzer that they were unable to agree. The jurors later told reporters that they had been hopelessly deadlocked 4 to 4.

“We all tried very hard, but we just couldn’t agree,” said one juror, a woman who declined to give her name. “And there wasn’t any one issue that could have brought us together.”

Stephen Yagman, attorney for Braley’s stepmother, Linda Postma, said he will file a new lawsuit against Mallon and set up a status conference with Mallon’s attorneys next month. Postma received court permission to pursue the case against Mallon after her husband, Edward Postma, Braley’s father, died.

Mallon, a 44-year-old sheriff’s detective in special investigations, admitted that he had sex with Braley just hours before her strangled and bludgeoned body was discovered, but denied killing her. Los Angeles Police Detective Ted Ball said in an interview this week that the investigation is still open, but that Mallon is not a suspect.

Throughout the trial, Yagman, who specializes in suing police officers and departments, accused the Los Angeles Police Department and the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office of extending “professional courtesies” to Mallon by inadequately investigating the murder and refusing to prosecute him.

But Paul Paquette, one of Mallon’s attorneys, said police bent over backward to investigate Mallon to avoid criticism that they allowed a fellow law enforcement officer to get away with a crime. Police were so focused on investigating Mallon, he said, that they allowed the real killer to get away.

Braley was found strangled and beaten on the morning of Jan. 15, 1988, just hours after leaving the Hunter Bar in Van Nuys with Mallon and having sex with him in his unmarked, county-owned car.

Mallon, who went to the bar with several other deputies after the funeral of a sheriff’s deputy, admitted having at least 16 drinks while at the bar. He said he left with Braley shortly before midnight and engaged in oral sex with her in his car. But he said they soon left the area and drove to a more secluded spot, where Braley decided to get out.

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Yagman told the jury that Mallon failed in an attempt to have sex with Braley, flew into a rage when she tried to leave and then killed her.

But Paquette dismissed Yagman’s version of events as a kind of “murder mystery novel” and told the jury that physical evidence at the scene implicated Braley’s boyfriend, not Mallon, in her murder. The boyfriend, whose name was disclosed in court, was never charged with the crime.

Mallon, who has described the civil case as “a seven-year nightmare,” said Thursday that he was disappointed by the jury’s inability to exonerate him and did not relish the prospect of another trial.

“The only thing I’m happy about is this jury concluded I did not kill,” Mallon said outside the courtroom. “I just can’t tell you how it tears a person down to be accused of such a violent crime, knowing the only thing you did was embarrass yourself, embarrass the Sheriff’s Department and violate the trust my wife had in me.”

Mallon’s wife, Sheryl, a bank personnel director, was in court during closing arguments but not Thursday when the jury was dismissed. She clutched her arms and stared straight ahead during graphic descriptions of her husband’s sexual encounter with Braley, but said afterward that she remained convinced that he was not responsible for her death.

In interviews outside court, jurors said they were divided on the issue. Three women and one man wanted to hold Mallon responsible for Braley’s death, while one woman and three men did not, the jury foreman said.

Much of their deliberations centered on whether intoxicated people can be held responsible for their actions, the foreman said. And some jurors questioned whether Mallon was even capable of killing her while under the influence of so much alcohol, he said.