Deliberations begin in Carlsbad murder-for-hire trial

There is no dispute that a man was shot on a dark Carlsbad dirt path last year, and that an Oceanside gun instructor pulled the trigger. The gunman himself admitted it.

But the question of whether the gunman fired that shot as part of a conspiracy to kill the victim for $2,000 at the behest of the victim’s estranged wife was put into the hands of a North County jury Thursday.

Deliberations began late afternoon for the jurors in the case of Diana Lovejoy, 45, and Weldon McDavid, 50, who are accused of what the prosecution says was a botched murder-for-hire plot targeting Lovejoy’s now-ex-husband. He was shot, but survived.

Lovejoy and McDavid have pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to commit murder and to attempted murder in the Sept. 1, 2016 shooting.

Lovejoy did not testify during the roughly two-week trial.

McDavid did. He testified earlier this week that it was not a plot to kill Greg Mulvihill, just to set him up. McDavid said he fired the shot to snuff out a light in Mulvihill’s hand because Mulvihill had spotted him and he feared Mulvihill had a gun.

The jurors spent most of Thursday listening to closing arguments from the prosecution and the defense.

Lovejoy and Mulvihill were two years into a heated divorce and fierce custody battle over their young son, a legal fight that included allegations of abuse and drug use.

Lovejoy, a software technical writer, met McDavid at the gun range where he worked. McDavid later installed a security system in her home.

McDavid testified that Lovejoy had told him about her allegations of abuse. He said she agreed to pay him to for evidence she could use against Mulvihill in the custody battle — not to harm him.

Using a burner phone Lovejoy bought, McDavid called Mulvihill and pretended to be a private investigator shortly before 11 p.m. He told Mulvihill that he would provide Mulvihill with evidence proving abuse, that it would be on a pole along a dirt path of Avenida Soledad, near Rancho Santa Fe.

There was no such evidence. McDavid said that the idea was that if such a sketchy phone call could lure Mulvihill to a dark spot, he must be guilty of something. McDavid said he thought Lovejoy could use that against Mulvihill in the custody battle.

But when Mulvihill arrived, he had brought a friend and a flashlight. And that, Deputy District Attorney Jodi Breton said, thwarted the murder plan. Plus, she said, even though McDavid is an expert gunman, paper targets don’t move, but people do.

She said McDavid was acting as if he was in the theater of combat, but was really “operating in the theater of the absurd. And the puppet master of that theater is Diana Lovejoy.”

Breton also noted that Lovejoy was due to pay Mulvihill a $120,000 settlement as part of the divorce. They were to split custody of their son.

Both defense attorneys refuted the notion that there was as plan to kill.

Lovejoy’s attorney, Brad Patton, said his client and her then-husband had, in the weeks before the shooting, finally reached a divorce agreement, and that she was happy it was wrapping up.

“There is 100 percent no motive to murder Mr. Mulvihill,” Patton said.

He also said the prosecution had no evidence of a conspiracy to kill.

Defense attorney Ricky Crawford echoed that, and also said that his client, McDavid, is an expert shooter, a former Marine and School of Infantry instructor with the ability to hit where he is aiming within two inches.

Mulvihill had the light in his left hand, raised up as he peered around the brushy field. He was shot just under his left armpit.

“Did he try to kill him? No,” Crawford said. “But if he had tried to kill him, he would have done it.”

He said his client was never asked to perform a violent act.

“It was a hasty plan, a dumb plan, but it was not a plan to kill,” McDavid said.

The panel of four men and eight women will resume deliberations Monday.

teri.figueroa@sduniontribune.com

(760) 529-4945

Twitter: @TeriFigueroaUT