CHUTZPAH: GET AWAY WITH MURDER AND COMPLAIN ABOUT SENTENCE

Burn Husband to Death for Insurance Money & Plea to Avoid Jail
Post 4942

Mendy Powell Neal, who was charged with the first degree premeditated and felony murder of her husband and the aggravated arson of their home, entered a North Carolina v. Alford, 400 U.S. 25, 37 (1970), best interest plea to voluntary manslaughter, a Class C felony, in exchange for the dismissal of the felony murder and aggravated arson counts of the presentment and an agreed range of three to four years, with the trial court to determine the length and manner of service of the sentence.

At the conclusion of the sentencing hearing, the trial court denied the Defendant's request for judicial diversion, determined that she was not a suitable candidate for probation or other alternative sentencing, and sentenced her as a Range I, standard offender to four years at 30% in the Tennessee Department of Correction.

In State Of Tennessee v. Mendy Powell Neal, No. M2023-01176-CCA-R3-CD, Court of Criminal Appeals of Tennessee, Nashville (November 26, 2024) the Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed the trial court.

FACTS

The Defendant's husband, Matthew Neal, died in a house fire that totally consumed the couple's Charlotte log home. The Defendant was charged with the first degree premediated murder of the victim, the first degree felony murder of the victim during the perpetration of an aggravated arson, and the aggravated arson of the home.

The Defendant proceeded to a jury trial where the State presented evidence for three days establishing the crimes.

The neighbor, Mr. Swan and a responding deputy, who could hear the victim moaning on the other side of the closed front door, attempted to enter the home but were unable due to the intensity of the fire. The next day, the victim's burned body was found within ten feet of the front door. The victim was burned over 95% of his body and died of carbon monoxide toxicity and thermal injury. Autopsy showed he was drugged and couldn't escape.

Regardless of the evidence of premeditated murder the trial court found that the Defendant's lack of a criminal history was an applicable mitigating factor and enhancement factors that the victim was particularly vulnerable because of age or physical or mental disability, that the Defendant treated or allowed the victim to be treated with exceptional cruelty during the commission of the offense, that the Defendant had no hesitation about committing the crime when the risk to human life was high, and that the Defendant abused a position of private trust that significantly facilitated the commission of the offense.

The trial court found that sentencing the Defendant to the maximum length in the Tennessee Department of Correction "was the just and proper sentence due to the Defendant's misrepresentation and dishonesty as well as the overwhelming circumstantial proof of Defendant's conniving and forethought regarding the crime."

ANALYSIS

The Court of Criminal Appeals found that there was nothing that warranted waiver of the timely notice of appeal requirement with respect to the trial court's original sentencing determinations and the trial court acted well within its discretion in declining to reduce or modify the Defendant's sentence. The Defendant did not show any circumstances, warranting the alteration of her sentence in the interest of justice.

ZALMA OPINION

It takes a massive amount of chutzpah (Yiddish for unmitigated gall) to drug your husband so he could not escape being burned to death after setting fire to the house to kill him and collect on a life insurance policy, and then, when damning evidence was presented offer a Alford plea to manslaughter. To then complain that court imposed the maximum sentence even though her agreement with the court changed the aggravated, premeditated murder that could have resulted in life in prison to manslaughter and only 4 years.

(c) 2024 Barry Zalma & ClaimSchool, Inc.

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Sorry about the delay in posting. I'm recovering from pneumonia and spending most of the last week in bed with pills, Kleenex, coughing and sleep which I couldn't get in the hospital. Should be act in shape next week but doctors make no promises