An Irvine lady was convicted Friday of drowning her 92-year-old mom, who was discovered face down in a swimming pool in 2018.
Prosecutors argued that Cynthia Unusual, 70, hoped to safe her inheritance and keep away from paying again a debt when she went to her mom Ruth Unusual’s Huntington Seashore residence, stabbed her within the head and hauled her throughout the patio to the pool.
Whereas the Orange County Superior Courtroom jury discovered Unusual responsible of first-degree homicide, it rejected the prosecutor’s competition that she dedicated the crime for monetary acquire.
Cynthia Unusual in a police photograph.
(Huntington Seashore Police Division)
Leaving the motive unresolved, the decision had the hallmark of a compromise amongst jurors who had begun deliberating Tuesday after a seven-week trial that relied closely on circumstantial proof.
Deputy Dist. Atty. Nicholas Thomo advised jurors that Cynthia Unusual was jobless, depending on her mom’s cash and terrified of being reduce out of her will.
“If she kills Mother earlier than Mother takes her out of that can, that cash is hers,” Thomo mentioned.
Amy Hamilton, the defendant’s sister, went to her mom’s home on the morning of Sept. 4, 2018, to take her to a health care provider’s appointment.
She discovered the storage door open, which made her suspicious, and when her mom didn’t reply her calls, she summoned police.
Police entered the home and located blood within the lavatory, blood on the ground and blood soaking a reclining chair. Ruth Unusual’s physique was within the pool.
An post-mortem confirmed that she had been stabbed six occasions within the head, however drowning was the official reason for loss of life.
Whereas Cynthia Unusual left her cellphone at residence in Irvine on the evening of the killing, apparently to confuse detectives, surveillance cameras put her in her mom’s Huntington Seashore neighborhood, the prosecutor mentioned.
And police mentioned shoe print patterns discovered on the crime scene matched the Orthofeet model the defendant was identified to put on.
In the course of the trial, jurors heard voicemail messages that Ruth Unusual had left for her daughter Amy Hamilton a day or so earlier than her loss of life, saying Cynthia was outdoors her home.
“I’m afraid,” she mentioned in a panicked voice. “I don’t know what she’s as much as …. Please reply. I need assistance … She is within the driveway …”
Although the defendant, slumped ahead in a wheelchair all through the trial, didn’t testify, it was her personal voice that may have sealed her conviction.
She may very well be heard on recordings of Google searches she made earlier than her mom’s loss of life. In a single, she requested, “Hey Google, what’s the typical age at loss of life of an American lady?” In one other: “How do you break a neck?”
She inquired about “indicators of being smothered,” concerning the results of injecting an individual with air, concerning the distinction between a bruise from a fall and a bruise from being struck.
“These will not be harmless searches,” Thomo mentioned, arguing that Cynthia Unusual had proven a consciousness of guilt by trying to erase her search historical past.
Asst. Public Defender Sara Ross urged that Unusual’s sister, who was not charged, was the actual killer, motivated by the $2-million inheritance.
“Amy Hamilton had 2 million causes to need her mom lifeless,” Ross mentioned.
The protection legal professional described Hamilton as a “grifter” who had manipulated her mom into altering the household belief to favor her and had deceived the older lady into believing that Cynthia meant her hurt.
“She was bleeding Ruth dry the final a number of years of Ruth’s life,” she mentioned of Hamilton. “She’s determined for cash, however she doesn’t wish to work.”
Hamilton invoked the fifth Modification somewhat than testify at trial, and Choose Lewis Clapp advised jurors to not speculate about why.
Ross argued that her shopper was bodily incapable of what prosecutors alleged. She suffers from arthritis and had shoulder surgical procedure six weeks earlier than her mom’s loss of life, making it unlikely that she might drag or carry her mom to the pool, her lawyer mentioned.
The protection struggled to elucidate away the incriminating Google searches. “She’s looking a variety of bizarre stuff,” Ross admitted. She mentioned her shopper preferred spy novels and true crime.
“None of [the searches] contain stabbing, drowning — the way in which Ruth was killed on this case.”
Cynthia Unusual faces 25 years to life in jail when Choose Clapp sentences her on July 12.
