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Prosecutors rest their case

Hoerig’s lawyers will begin her defense Tuesday

Tribune Chronicle / Renee Fox Forensic pathologist Joseph Felo, standing, demonstrates on Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins the angle at which he believes one of three bullets hit Karl Hoerig in March 2007. Hoerig’s wife, Claudia Hoerig, is on trial for aggravated murder. The prosecution rested its case Friday and the trial is expected to resume Tuesday.

WARREN — The state rested its case Friday against the woman accused of premeditating the shooting death of her husband in 2007 — one year after she was booked into the Trumbull County Jail after being extradited from Brazil.

A forensic pathologist Friday demonstrated the position he believed Karl Hoerig was in when he was shot, friends of his testified about interactions they had with the pilot and Claudia Hoerig, and the defense called into question the prosecutor’s picture of the way the shooting happened.

A one-minute and eight-second segment that was not in an enhanced version of the audio-video interview Claudia Hoerig had with investigators Jan. 17, 2018, the evening she arrived in Trumbull County, was played for the jury Friday after it was left out of the recording Thursday.

The segment was missing as the result of a technical error, said Michael Yannucci, a Trumbull County Sheriff’s Office detective who testified about the interview he conducted.

The defense questioned if more of the recording was not complete and accurate, and if Yannucci checked it after Trumbull County Prosecutor Dennis Watkins brought the missing segment to his attention Thursday evening. Watkins noticed because the recording didn’t match the transcript.

Yannucci said he didn’t.

“You didn’t double check the rest of it?” said defense attorney John Cornely.

“It was late, and time didn’t permit it, Yannucci said.

The defense asked Wednesday if Trumbull County Common Pleas Court Judge Andrew D. Logan would prohibit the use of the transcript by the jury, but the motion was denied.

The state later called forensic pathologist Joseph Felo to testify in lieu of Dr. Humphrey Germaniuk, who was the Trumbull County coroner and forensic pathologist who conducted the autopsy on Karl Hoerig in 2007, because Germaniuk died last year. Felo has testified as an expert witness in more than 180 Ohio cases and has conducted more than 3,000 autopsies. He studied the case file Germaniuk built in 2007.

Felo said it is his opinion that Karl Hoerig was crouched over when he was shot from behind through the shoulder. Prosecutors contend Hoerig was tying his shoes at the bottom of the stairs and his wife ambushed him while he was crouched over. Felo and Watkins demonstrated to the jury the angle at which they believe Karl Hoerig was shot.

The defense disputes the idea that he was “ambushed.”

After holding a gun she bought days before to her own head, she turned it on Karl after he told her to commit suicide somewhere that it wouldn’t make a mess, hitting him, making him go limp and sending him stumbling down the steps as she continued to shoot, the defense has said. Testimony earlier in the week indicated there was no blood on the steps.

Felo said there would be evidence of that — like bruising or abrasions. Cornely asked if bruising happens after death, or only when someone is alive. Felo said, except in rare occasions, the body doesn’t bruise after death. Cornely said that if Karl Hoerig died instantaneously, falling down the stairs might not cause bruising.

When questioning Yannucci, Cornely called into question the position of Karl Hoerig’s shoes. The toe of one was facing the stairs, instead of out, according to photos, he said.

Yannucci said the shoe could have been in his hand, and fell when he was shot.

Friends of Karl Hoerig testified Friday they knew he planned to leave Claudia Hoerig.

And one woman testified she was good friends with Karl Hoerig because the two knew each other in the U.S. Air Force Reserve. At a party seven months before Karl Hoerig died, Claudia Hoerig told her, “‘If (Karl Hoerig) ever leaves me, I’ll kill him.'”

The trial resumes Tuesday because the courts are closed Monday in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

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