Case Against Dally Weak, Misleading, Jurors Told

Responding to a lengthy closing argument by the prosecution, attorneys for accused killer Michael Dally told a jury Thursday that the evidence against their client is thin, speculative and fails to prove he killed his wife.

“This case is put together on tissue paper,” attorney James Farley argued in his closing summation.

Farley accused prosecutors of launching a character attack against his client to win a murder conviction, and urged jurors not to allow such evidence to sway their deliberations.

“Don’t go charging off because he’s not a nice guy and assume things that have not been proved,” Farley told the jury. The panel is expected to get the case today after the defense finishes its summation and prosecutors offer a rebuttal.

Dally, 37, is accused of conspiring to kill his wife, Sherri, with his longtime lover, Diana Haun. The 36-year-old former grocery clerk was convicted of murder last fall and sentenced to life in prison.

During Dally’s six-week trial, prosecutors called more than 100 witnesses in an attempt to show he hated his wife, wanted her dead and eventually duped Haun into carrying out a elaborate murder plan.

Among their key witnesses was an ex-girlfriend who testified that in 1991 Dally told her he wanted someone to stab his wife or push her off a cliff. Sherri Dally was kidnapped, stabbed and beaten to death on May 6, 1996. Her body was dumped into a steep ravine near Ojai.

They also questioned dozens of friends and co-workers who described Dally’s cruel demeanor toward his wife before her death, as well as his seemingly uncaring attitude afterward.

In concluding her two-day summation, Deputy Dist. Atty. Lela Henke-Dobroth told jurors that Dally believed he could get away with murder if no one could tie him to the crime.

But in their closing remarks, Farley and co-counsel Robert Schwartz pinned the slaying squarely on Haun, or as Schwartz referred to her, “that psycho, wacko, maniacal, crazy lady.”

It was Haun, they argued, who was obsessed with Dally and determined not to lose him. The lawyers have suggested that their client was reconciling with his wife, making Haun jealous.

According to trial testimony, Haun bought a disguise and rented a car days before the kidnap-slaying. Sherri Dally’s blood was found pooled in the back seat of that car.

On the day of the killing, Haun made a series of phone calls--including one to a Camarillo dry cleaners where she asked how to get a lot of blood out of the back seat of a car.

“There are mountains of evidence in this case that have shown that Diana Haun killed Sherri Dally,” Farley said.

But there is no direct evidence to support the prosecution’s claim that Dally helped Haun plan the murder, he said. He called the prosecution’s theory that Dally told Haun how and when to kidnap his wife “speculation.” And he reminded the jury that there is not a shred of physical evidence--no fingerprints, no blood--linking his client to the crime scene.

Henke-Dobroth told the jury in her summation that Dally lied to police. But Farley said his client was honest and cooperative during the police investigation of his wife’s disappearance, even agreeing to place a “cool call” to his lover while authorities were listening.

“Is he covering up for something?” the lawyer asked. “Does he even know what is going on? . . . Mike Dally is trying to find out what happened to Sherri.”

In terms of the character assault, Farley said there has been mountains of evidence presented about Dally’s adultery, drug use and mistreatment of his wife. But none of those things, he argued, proves Dally committed murder.

“I am not here to make excuses for the way Mike Dally treated his wife,” Farley said, speaking in a firm voice. “It was abominable. Abominable. But that does not make him a murderer. It makes him a rotten guy.”

Farley and Schwartz, who divided the closing defense summation, told the jury that prosecutors had presented misleading evidence or twisted it in such a way to bolster their theory of the case, such as describing Dally in conflicting terms.

“How can you be Machiavellian and sinister and stupid at the same time?” Farley asked. “The prosecution wants it both ways.”

After Farley’s argument, which lasted less than an hour, Schwartz went on the attack, taking personal jabs at the lead prosecutor and telling jurors she misled them in her summary of the evidence.

“I had no idea that the prosecutor was going to take a day and a half for her closing summation,” he said sharply, before turning to the facts of the case. “A lot of things she said sounded really good. Then I realized, it sounded good, but that’s not what the evidence said.”

To illustrate his point, Schwartz wrote dates that Henke-Dobroth had referred to in her remarks in bold black letters on a large paper pad. He told the jury that she had several facts wrong, as he ripped the paper from the pad.

“Their theory of circumstantial evidence has more holes than a pound of Swiss cheese,” Schwartz yelled across the courtroom. As he shouted, some jurors fidgeted and set down their note pads.

“Diana Haun did everything in this case,” Schwartz continued, asserting that there is no proof Haun and Dally conspired to commit murder.

Rather, he suggested, it was Haun--acting alone--who decided to kill her lover’s wife after an angry confrontation between the two women in the parking lot where Michael Dally worked.

“Diana Haun--make no mistake--is no timid little cream puff,” Schwartz said, describing that argument as the catalyst to murder. “It was set in motion that day--right after that confrontation.”

Even if Michael Dally knew what Diana Haun was going to do on May 6, Schwartz added, the jury would have to find him not guilty because the law states mere knowledge of the crime does not constitute murder.

“At best,” Schwartz said, “it might make him guilty as an accessory after the fact.”

Earlier this week, Superior Court Judge Charles W. Campbell Jr. ruled that the jury will be allowed to consider a charge of accessory after the fact for Dally, which could mean a jail sentence of as little as 16 months.

However, Dally, who is accused of murder, kidnapping and conspiracy, faces a possible death sentence if he is found guilty of murder and one of two special circumstances.

Those circumstances are that the murder was committed for financial gain and that it occurred while Sherri Dally’s killer was lying in wait.