Crime & Safety

Jury Chosen in Facebook Murder-for-Hire Trial

11 men and 5 women will serve in Christine Metter's trial

Jury selection is complete in the trial of a Beachwood woman accused of trying to hire a hitman on Facebook.

Defense attorneys and the prosecutors whittled the jury pool from 67 to 58 during one-on-one interviews and from a written questionnaire before calling the remaining jurors into the courtroom and questioning them further.

Selection took until 6 p.m. Monday. Sixteen jurors, 11 men and five women, will serve during the trial of Christine Metter, who is charged with two counts of conspiracy to commit murder.

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Metter, 41, of Beachwood, was out of prison blues for the first time in the courtroom Monday, wearing black slacks and a black and white blouse, her hair down. She did not speak except to her lawyers during the proceedings.

Metter and her father Al Zombory are accused of offering money first to Metter's high school friend, and later to an undercover detective, to kill her ex-husband.

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 said Sabo. He testified in an earlier hearing that when she complained about her ex in a Facebook chat, he jokingly suggested she put a hit on him. But she took him seriously, Sabo said, and her father later offered him $50,000 to do it.

Defense attorney Larry Zuckerman and that Metter feared for her safety when the alleged crime took place.

that psychological testimony that Metter exhibits traits from two personality disorders could be used in the trial.

Zuckerman asked the jury if they believed entrapment is a legitimate defense and if anyone had acted as a police informant.

He also questioned jury members’ relationships with police officers, causing one potential juror to bristle when he suggested that police are competitive by nature.

“You don’t want to go there,” the man, an ex-Marine who served as a military police officer, said. Zuckerman excused him during the final jury selection.

Assistant Prosecuting Attorney Lisa Neroda asked the jurors if they would be made uncomfortable by police testifying that they were undercover, if they disagreed that talking or planning constitutes a crime, and if anyone had been through an uncomfortable divorce or child custody battle.

All 16 jurors will serve during the trial and four will be chosen at random to act as alternates during deliberation at the end of the trial.

Tuesday morning the jury is scheduled to two Eastlake locations involved in the alleged crime: The Captain’s Club restaurant, where the two are accused of offering Sabo the job, and a parking lot nearby where the police sting took place.

His trial is scheduled for Jan. 31.


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