Susan Wright: She Just Couldn’t Stop Stabbing Him

Susan Wright claims that her husband was abusive and tried to kill her. The prosecution claims that Susan Wright made up the abuse allegations and killed her husband for insurance money. And what the prosecutor did in the courtroom was wild and totally unprecedented. Which side do YOU believe?

Watch the Video

Susan Wright’s Background

Upper middle class family in Harris County TX
Father a mechanical engineer with a short temper, abusive (according to both Susan and Cindy)
Mother a traditional homemaker
Susan Wright quote: “We did our best to put on a smile and make everything look normal. When he got mad, we tried not to be seen. I thought that’s what happened in every house. If you had told me every husband didn’t yell at his wife or make her feel less than dirt, I wouldn’t have believed you.”
Parents deny allegations of abuse
Lacked confidence growing up
Sought attention from boys, one encouraged her to dance at a topless bar when she 18 and still in high school
Met Jeffrey Wright in 1997, at age 20, while on a trip to Galveston, TX
He brought her flowers and took her out to nice restaurants and nightclub
He told her loved her soon after meeting
February 1998: Susan pregnant, Jeff told her he was open to her getting an abortion
October 1998: Married, bought a house in the Houston suburbs
Became a homemaker like her mother
2000: miscarried after Jeff kicked her in the stomach, Jeff said no money to go to hospital
2001: Kaily born

Ineffective Defense Counsel

Neal Davis, Susan Wright’s defense attorney, had never defended a case involving a battered woman
Todd Ward, co-counsel, had never defended a murder case before
Davis and Ward unable or unwilling to object to 10 improper statements in Siegler’s opening statement. They failed to object to 21 instances of improper cross-examination of Susan Wright
Mismatch of inexperienced defense counsel vs. an experienced and very aggressive prosecutor
No expert on Battered Women’s Syndrome was called to testify
Dr. Jerome Brown, who treated Wright in a psychiatric facility, was not called to testify
Misty McMichael, a former girlfriend of Jeff Wright, would have corroborated Susan Wright’s claims of abusive behavior, was not called to testify

Misty McMichael

1989 – Worked as a stripper at the Colorado Bar and Grill in Houston
She met Jeffrey Wright at this place and said he was a “big-time spender”
She dated Jeffrey Wright and they were soon engaged
Wright was initially charming, but later became abusive, especially after drinking
When he was “sober he was really sweet and he wanted to go to church and pray a lot [but] when he was drinking he was mean and abusive towards me.” (pdf)
Verbal abuse
Threw her down a spiral staircase and then backhanded her across the face (pdf – incident on p. 20)
At a bar, he tried to backhand her but hit a glass that was on the table. The glass broke and a shard landed in Misty’s chin, causing serious bleeding. Misty filed a police report
She dropped charges, claiming it was an accident, for fear that Jeff would be even more violent after getting out of jail
Misty lived in a windowless apartment above his parents’ business
Jeffrey Wright locked Misty in her apartment while he went out, probably to meet other women
Misty escaped and fled to Houston where Wright eventually found her but Misty had another boyfriend so Wright left her alone
Susan Wright’s attorneys claimed Misty had not returned their phone calls. They also worried that Misty lacked credibility due to “questionable character”
Brian Wice, Wright’s appeals attorney, got Misty on the phone without any trouble

Shelby Moore, domestic violence expert

Professor at South Texas College of Law
Expert in domestic violence
Was told that she wasn’t called to testify because Wright had run out of money and couldn’t afford to hire her as an expert. Moore said she woulda done it for free

Dr. Jerome Brown

Evaluated Susan Wright’s mental state at Harris County Psychiatric Center
“extreme state of fear and dissociation”

Kelly Siegler

Harris County, TX prosecutor
Described by a mentor: “A trial with Kelly is one-half soap opera and one-half Law & Order, with just enough Jerry Springer sprinkled in to keep things exciting”

Prosecution Argument

Susan was a topless dancer
Suggested that Susan was into bondage
Susan Wright seduced Jeffrey Wright
She lured him into the bedroom for kinky sex and tied him up
Susan worked really hard to clean up the murder scene and hide the body
Wanted $200,000 in insurance money
Susan claimed physical abuse but there was no concrete evidence, no hospital records or police reports
The plan fell apart when the family’s dog dug up Jeff’s body

Defense Argument

Jeffrey Wright abused Susan, and she was afraid that Jeff would kill her
Jeff came home from boxing at the gym, was high on coke, and hit 4-year-old Bradly in the face when the boy refused to box, knocking the boy backward
Jeff was high on cocaine and went into a rage when Susan suggested he needed help with anger and drug abuse issues
Jeff threw Susan down on the floor, kicked her, put her on the bed, raped her
Susan closed her eyes during the rape “like [she] always did” when that happened
Jeff said “Die bitch,” and when Susan opened her eyes, he had a knife
She grabbed the knife as it came down, and she kneed him in the balls
She pushed Jeff off of her, stabbed him in the neck and chest
Son knocks on the door
She tied one of his hands to the bed and puts her son to bed
She got another knife before returning to the bedroom and continued stabbing him
She cleaned the house because she believed Jeff was still alive
She went and bought soil to put over Jeff’s body because she thought he was going to get up

Susan Wright quotes

“I knew the second that I stopped that he was going to kill me.”

(after burying Jeff in the backyard) “… I watched for Jeff to get up, because I was afraid the second I went to sleep he was going to get up and come after me again.”

(on why she didn’t just divorce him) “He told me if I ever left him, he was going to kill me. It’s not as simple as getting a divorce. When someone hurts you that bad and they tell you that they’re going to kill you, you just can’t get up and leave.”

Evidence

41 stab wounds to the face
23 to the neck
46 to the chest
22 to abdomen
7 to pubic area
19 to legs
23 to arms and hand
1 to back
Tip of knife broken off in Jeff’s skull
Candle wax on thigh and scrotum
Found in backyard: blood-soaked mattress, box spring, comforter, headboard
Master BR: piece of carpet cut out, one wall painted, receipt for two gallons of bleach, bleach-soaked jeans