The handyman who fatally beat the elderly owners of an Alabama motel with his hammer, and slit the throat of one of them, has been sentenced to death.
A Jefferson County jury unanimously recommended a death sentence for 32-year-old Steven Richard Mulkey in the 2018 murders of 76-year-old Siumei Kao and 77-year-old Ching Kao at the Siesta Motel in Irondale.
The jury on Monday – after a week-long trial – convicted Mulkey of capital murder of two or more persons. He was found not guilty of capital murder during a robbery and a burglary.
On Monday afternoon, the sentencing phase of the trial began. After 1 /2 days of testimony in the phase, the jury on Wednesday deliberated 35 minutes before recommending death.
Jefferson County Circuit Judge Alaric May then went with the jury’s recommendation and imposed the death sentence.
Jefferson County Chief Deputy District Attorney Joe Roberts and Assistant District Attorney Neal Zarzour prosecuted the case. They said they were pleased with the verdict and the sentence.
“We recognize that a death sentence is an extreme and final sentence, but the defendant earned this sentence with the senseless, brutal murder of Mr. and Mrs. Kao,’’ Roberts said. “The jury took this case very seriously.”
“They were very attentive and considered all the evidence and worked hard to reach the correct result. We thank them for their service,’’ Roberts said. “We want to thank the Irondale Police Department for their hard work and the Ko family who trusted us to prosecute this case and get justice for their family.”
This is the first time in at least several years that the death sentence has been handed down in Jefferson County.
“We’re happy with the verdict and obviously the victim’s family is as well,’’ said District Attorney Danny Carr. “Joe and Neal did a great job holding him accountable for the horrific crime he committed.”
Mulkey was defended by attorneys Chris Daniel and Scott Brower. They declined to comment on the outcome.
The brutal murders happened inside the Siesta Motel in Irondale on Sunday, Sept. 16, 2018. The Kaos were immigrants who came to Alabama in search of the “American Dream.”
The Kaos wrapped, decomposed bodies were found more than a week later in a remote area in Leeds.
There was no dispute that Mulkey carried out the horrific crime. The killings took about 15 minutes, and each minute was captured on the couple’s motel surveillance video.
The couple was fatally bludgeoned with Mulkey’s hammer, and Mrs. Kao’s throat slit.
Jurors had to decide if Mulkey knew right from wrong at the time of the murders. He had pleaded not guilty by reason of mental disease or defect.
“Normally in a murder case, you don’t get to see exactly what happened. We have to take eyewitnesses, direct evidence, circumstantial evidence, physical evidence from the scene, we take all those things, and we try to paint a picture for you guys to try to help you see and understand and image what happened and how bad it was,’’ Roberts told jurors in opening statements last week.
“That won’t be necessary in this case,’’ Roberts said. “The video shows exactly what happened. And it shows that this defendant is a cold-blooded killer.”
Mulkey’s attorneys disagreed.
“You’re going to see evidence of drug addiction for Steven Mulkey, a lifetime of mental illness, poverty, homelessness. What you’re never going to hear (from the defense attorneys) that this is right or good or justified. We’re never going to tell you that,’’ Daniel told the jury.
“This isn’t a case about justification,’’ Daniel said. “It’s about understanding.”
Mulkey took the stand in his own defense, testifying for more than an hour Friday morning.
He told jurors he blacked out during the murders.
“My body just took over,’’ Mulkey testified. “It’s just animosity, aggression. It wasn’t me. It was not me. I can’t explain it.”
“I didn’t realize what I did until I woke up and looked around and I was like, “Whoa. What have I done?”
There was extra security in the courtroom as Mulkey took the stand, including two deputies standing just feet from him.
Under questioning by Daniel, one of his attorneys, Mulkey explained that he suffered from behavioral problems beginning at an early age and spent much of his childhood in and out of group homes and institutions.
He said he has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, obsessive compulsive disorder, ADD and ADHD.
Mulkey said he began using drugs at the age of 12, including alcohol, marijuana and methamphetamine. “Anything a teenager could get his hands on,’’ he said.
During his testimony, Mulkey chronicled the events leading up to the murders, and the hours and days after when he dumped their bodies and fled the state to avoid prosecution. He was captured by U.S. Marshals in Virginia.
Asked by his attorney if he killed the Kaos while he was high on meth, Mulkey said, “I honestly don’t know what overcame me, man.”
Mulkey testified he remembered the argument that led up to the killings – a dispute about what the couple owned him for cutting grass – and the moments after the killings, but doesn’t remember the murders at all.
“Do you see that that’s kind convenient that you say, I remember everything right up to the murders and then I remember everything after the murders, but I just blacked out when the terrible thing happened that I did and I can’t talk about it because I don’t remember,’’ Roberts said. “You see how that’s convenient for the jury where (they don’t) get to hear your version of what happened? “
Mulkey replied that, “When you’re doing drugs like that, it just overtakes you all of the sudden, out of the blue.”
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