Woman Pleads Not Guilty in Slaying of Lover’s Wife

As grocery clerk Diana J. Haun pleaded not guilty Monday to the slaying of Ventura homemaker Sherri Dally, the victim’s husband appeared briefly before a grand jury investigating the May homicide, but was dismissed after asking for an attorney.

Haun, 35, appearing relaxed in a blue jail smock and even smiling twice, asserted her innocence to charges of kidnapping and first-degree murder under special circumstances of premeditation and lying in wait, which would allow her to be put to death if convicted.

As a phalanx of television and print photographers focused on the pale Haun at an early-morning arraignment, she stood quietly, speaking only to her lawyers. Arrested Thursday after a three-month Ventura police investigation, the Port Hueneme woman was ordered held in County Jail without bail.

Meanwhile, in a courthouse chamber two floors above, Michael Dally, the victim’s husband and Haun’s longtime lover, slipped out of the closed grand jury session 20 minutes after he had arrived at 9:15 a.m., asking to meet with a lawyer about his rights.

“They advised him he had a right to an attorney, and he said he wanted one,” said Ventura lawyer James Farley, who has defended murder suspects and who said he is acting as Dally’s legal advisor. “I’m not his lawyer, he’s not charged with a crime. I’m just advising him at this time.”

Dally has been subpoenaed to testify before the grand jury Friday, and Farley said he thinks Dally will be able to answer every question. The lawyer said he does not expect Dally to invoke his 5th Amendment right against self-incrimination.

“As far as I can tell there isn’t any evidence against him,” Farley said. “There’s a lot of suspicion, but suspicion is a bucket with a hole in it.”

Sherri Dally, a 35-year-old homemaker and day-care center operator, was abducted May 6 from the parking lot of a Ventura department store. Her skeletal remains--skull bludgeoned and upper torso stabbed repeatedly--were found by a search party of friends June 1 in a ravine north of Ventura.

After Haun’s arrest last week, a police spokesman said investigators believe that at least one other person was involved in the crime. Michael Dally remains a suspect, the spokesman confirmed.

“The police tell us they have not eliminated Mr. Dally as a suspect, and I’m sure they’re going to be looking to see if there’s something there [in grand jury testimony],” Farley said. “But I don’t think they’re going to find zip.”

Dally, 36, a grocery clerk who worked with Haun for 2 1/2 years at a Vons in Oxnard, was one of several witnesses called before the grand jury Monday. Prosecutors hope to present enough evidence over the next two weeks that jurors will indict Haun, sending the case directly to trial in Superior Court without a preliminary hearing.

Times correspondent Scott Steepleton contributed to this story.