Superior Court Judge Rogelio Flores has declared a mistrial for the murder trial of 90-year-old Marjorie Good on the basis of jury misconduct, according to Good’s defense attorney David Bixby.
Good was charged in May 2015 with the first-degree murder of her daughter, Solvang resident Heidi Good. Heidi suffered from Lou Gehrig’s Disease, and died on March 25, 2013, after her breathing tube was disconnected and she was administered a toxic dose of medication.
In May 2015, the Santa Barbara County District Attorney’s Office accused Good of murdering her daughter. Wanda Nelson, Heidi’s caretaker, faced the same criminal charges.
In mid-February, a jury found Nelson not guilty of first- and second-degree murder, but guilty of involuntary manslaughter. In Good’s case, an alleged jury misconduct occurred when a handful of jurors learned the outcome of Nelson’s case via news outlets, which Flores had instructed them to avoid because the news might affect their decision making.
According to Bixby, one of Good’s jurors learned that a handful of others had heard about Nelson’s verdict. This was brought to the court’s attention via memorandum, and as the behavior in question violated Flores’ requirements, the judge declared mistrial on Feb. 23.
Bixby said that by the time of Flores’ declaration, Good’s jurors could’ve been approaching a decision similar to Nelson’s. The jury had already filled in verdicts saying Good was not guilty of first- and second-degree murder, he said.
“The only thing they could have found her guilty on was the lesser included [involuntary] manslaughter,” Bixby said. “But they were deadlocked and hung up on that particular count.”
On Tuesday, Bixby filed a motion to compel the courts to record the verdicts given by the jury at the time of mistrial. This means if Good is retried later on, the trial would only concern the charge for involuntary manslaughter and not charges for first- or second-degree murder, because jurors had already decided she was not guilty on those counts.
“Anybody that’s been around Marjorie Good for more than 10 minutes knows she has no capacity to be a murderer,” Bixby said.
Good will return to court March 21 for a hearing on the motion and discussion of a possible settlement or new trial.
“This war isn’t over yet,” Bixby said. “We’re still going at it.”
This article appears in Mar 3-10, 2016.