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Not-Guilty Plea Entered in 3 Yosemite Slayings

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TIMES STAFF WRITER

Head bowed and blinking hard, motel handyman Cary Stayner pleaded not guilty Wednesday to the abduction and slaying of three Yosemite sightseers, a crime that caught international attention and struck a chord of fear in the central Sierra.

Stayner’s plea in this sparsely populated county’s antique courthouse sets up a March 5 preliminary hearing and comes just a week after the muscular 39-year-old defendant was sentenced to life in prison without parole for the murder of a park naturalist.

The 10-minute hearing marked the first time Stayner had faced the husband of Carole Sund, the 43-year-old Eureka woman he is accused of killing along with her daughter, 15-year-old Juli, and a family friend visiting from Argentina, Silvina Pelosso, 16.

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Prosecutors say Stayner killed the three in February 1999 after entering their room at Cedar Lodge on the pretext of fixing a leaky pipe. Arrested after the murder of naturalist Joie Armstrong five months later, he confessed to all four killings, authorities said.

Jens Sund sat impassively during the hearing, his brother and sister on either side on the tiny courtroom’s pew-like wood benches.

Just across the room, separated by an old cast-iron stove once used to heat the courthouse, Stayner’s father, Del, huddled alone, face unflinching as he watched another family tragedy involving a second Stayner son continue to unfold. Cary’s younger brother, Steven, was abducted as a child by a pedophile in a widely publicized case but managed to escape seven years later, only to die as a young adult in a motorcycle accident.

“I was repulsed,” Sund said afterward, as a horde of TV cameras and reporters crowded around him on the front lawn of the white clapboard courthouse. “Because of what he did.”

Sund said he believes the case qualifies for capital punishment, but said he would be happy to “just let the jury decide.” Mariposa County Dist. Atty. Christine Johnson has delayed any decision on whether she will seek the death penalty.

“I know what I’d like to do,” Sund said calmly. “But it’s not up to me. I’d probably look like a kook if I told you what I’d like to do.”

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In addition to the three murder counts, Stayner faces five other charges--including robbery, burglary and attempted rape--that could create the legal special circumstances that would qualify him for execution.

Local law enforcement officials in this county of 16,000 have expressed concern for weeks about security in the high-profile case. Special cameras have been installed atop the county jail, and at least a dozen sheriff’s deputies patrolled the courthouse grounds Wednesday.

Out back, yellow police tape kept back the media and a handful of curious locals while Stayner shuffled in, his wrists, ankles and waist shackled.

Attorneys on both sides say they expect the preliminary hearing to take about five days. Though that initial examination may remain in Mariposa County, a change of venue will almost certainly be sought before trial. Stayner’s defense attorney has discussed hiring a polling firm to find a spot in the state where the public is untainted by media coverage of the notorious case.

A venue change was granted in the federal government’s prosecution of Stayner for the July 1999 beheading in Yosemite of naturalist Joie Armstrong. That case was being tried in federal court because the slaying occurred inside the national park, while the killing of the Sunds and Pelosso took place at a lodge in El Portal, a community outside the park’s western boundary.

Legal experts say Stayner may attempt to establish some sort of diminished mental capacity as a defense. He underwent a brain scan a few months ago at UC Irvine.

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But his defense attorney, Santa Monica lawyer Michelle Morrissey, said she would not comment on what tack she plans to take. Afterward, encircled by TV news cameras, she even hedged on the possibility of a trial, saying only that “anything is possible.”

In a separate move Wednesday, Morrissey petitioned the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals to block release of documents in the federal case, including portions of Stayner’s confession that she believes would prejudice any potential jurors at a trial in the sightseer slayings.

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