Martin MacNeill

HLN is live-blogging the Martin MacNeill murder trial. Minute-by-minute updates can be found under this story.

Former Utah doctor Martin MacNeill was a coldhearted husband who moved his mistress into the family’s house not long after his wife’s funeral, alleged a prosecuting attorney Thursday in the first day of MacNeill’s murder trial.

Prosecutor Sam Pead also accused Martin MacNeill of being all smiles at his wife Michele’s burial, and said he talked about “how odd it was to be a bachelor again.”

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PROVO — As first responders worked to revive his wife, an agitated Martin MacNeill shouted directives for her treatment and told a fire chief he thought the former beauty queen had overdosed on painkillers and then fallen and hit her head in the tub.

He also railed against God for Michele MacNeill’s apparent death.

“He said that based on his affiliation (with the LDS Church) and the amount of money he’s donated, this is how God repaid him,” Pleasant Grove Fire Chief Marc Sanderson testified.

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Jury selection starts Tuesday; prosecutors say motive was younger woman.

By JessicaMiller | The Salt Lake Tribune

Michele MacNeill, the mother of eight children and a former beauty queen, seems an unlikely candidate to have been killed in her own bathtub. While her husband, a well-known Utah County doctor who also has a law degree, seems just as unlikely in the role of murder suspect.

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The neighbor of Martin MacNeill testified at the Utah doctor’s murder trial today that she found MacNeill’s wife lifeless in a bathtub wearing only a black long-sleeve shirt.

Next-door neighbor Kristi Daniels told the jury that six-year-old Ada MacNeill came to her and said, “my dad needs some help.”

When Daniels entered the home on April 11, 2007, she said she stood in the doorway of the bathroom where Martin MacNeill was with his wife, Michele, who was unconscious in the bathtub and whose skin was a “greenish pale” color.

“It all happened so fast,” Daniels kept saying on the stand in the courtroom in Provo, Utah.

Full story and video here

March 06, 2013 12:25 am  •  Paige Fieldsted – Daily Herald

PROVO – Tuesday should have marked the beginning of a six-week murder trial in the Martin MacNeill case, but instead attorneys are still hashing out issues of evidence and alleged misconduct by both parties.

In December MacNeill’s defense attorneys filed a motion to dismiss or disqualify the Utah County Attorney’s Office from prosecuting the case. On Tuesday morning the two sides met to argue the state’s motion to strike that motion.

Prosecutor Sam Pead argued that the defense didn’t provide grounds for dismissal in its original motion. Pead also argued that the defense brought forth a number of issues that weren’t addressed in the original motion, which shouldn’t be considered by the judge when he makes his decision. read more »

By Emiley Morgan, Deseret News
Published: Tuesday, March 5 2013 5:28 p.m. MST

PROVO — A judge on Tuesday threw out a motion to dismiss the murder case against a Pleasant Grove doctor accused of killing his wife.

But 4th District Judge Samuel McVey will let attorneys for Martin MacNeill, 57, pursue an alternative course in seeking to have the Utah County Attorney’s Office disqualified from prosecuting him.

“I believe the defense should be able to present their case,” the judge said Tuesday, noting that he will ask defense attorneys to give a specific list of issues they want to explore. “I want to make sure this doesn’t turn into a fishing expedition.” read more »

By Emiley Morgan, Deseret News
Published: Monday, Dec. 17 2012 1:20 p.m. MST

ROVO — Attorneys for a Pleasant Grove doctor charged with murdering his wife filed a motion Monday to dismiss the case.

In the motion, attorneys for Martin MacNeill ask for either a dismissal of the charges against their client or the disqualification of the Utah County Attorney’s Office from prosecuting the case. They allege that prosecutors and investigators with the Utah County Attorney’s Office kept them from more than 1,000 pages of information — some of it “explosive” — that they believe points to their client’s innocence.

MacNeill, 56, has pleaded not guilty to charges of murder, a first-degree felony, and obstruction of justice, a second-degree felony, in the April 11, 2007, death of his wife, Michele MacNeill, 50. He was ordered to stand trial following a preliminary hearing in October. A five-week trial is scheduled to begin March 5, 2013.

MacNeill’s attorneys argue that the case has been “irreparably compromised” because of evidence they say they asked for and never received, including information about the MacNeills’ son, Damian. read more »

Posted on: 12:01 pm, October 11, 2012, by Brittany Green-Miner, Meredith Forrest Kulwicki and Tamara Vaifanua

PROVO, Utah – A Utah County doctor will stand trial for allegedly killing his wife in 2007.

The decision was made Thursday during Dr. Martin MacNeill’s preliminary hearing. read more »

JIM DALRYMPLE – DAILY HERALD

PROVO — After nearly two hours of argument Thursday morning, Judge Samuel McVey walked into a Provo courtroom and ordered Martin MacNeill to stand trial for murder.

MacNeill, who was shackled and sitting across the room in a jail jumpsuit, cocked his head slightly to the left but otherwise showed no emotion as the judge read the ruling.

The decision means a jury likely will hear the evidence that in August led prosecutors to charge MacNeill with first-degree felony murder and second-degree felony obstruction of justice. The charges stem from allegations that MacNeill killed his wife, Michele, in 2007 a week after pushing her to have plastic surgery.

After delivering his ruling Thursday, McVey provided a lengthy explanation of the case as it had been argued over nearly two weeks of testimony. Among other things, the explanation detailed how MacNeill, a doctor, was having an affair with Gypsy Willis at the time of Michele’s death. McVey went on to single out testimony by Willis and another of MacNeill’s former mistresses as being “inherently incredible.” read more »

Pleasant Grove doctor ordered to stand trial for murder in wife’s 2007 death

Martin MacNeill accused of killing wife to continue affair with another woman.

By Jessica Miller | The Salt Lake Tribune
First Published Oct 09 2012 01:08 pm

“cocktail” of drugs that would have caused loss of consciousness, respiratory depression and coma, according to an expert who testified Tuesday during a preliminary hearing in 4th District Court.

Four drugs were found in Michele MacNeill’s blood after her death in April 2007: oxycodone, promethazine, diazepam and zolpidem, which is also known as Ambien.

Full article here

October 10, 2012 12:25 am  •  Jim Dalrymple – Daily Herald

PROVO – Steve Mickelson had worked with Martin MacNeill for seven years when he received a call on April 11 saying there was a problem.

“I had just received a call from Martin,” Mickelson testified Tuesday in court. “Something’s wrong at Martin’s home, and can you come over.”

Mickelson said when he arrived at the home he saw MacNeill’s wife, Michele, on the floor receiving CPR. Mickelson also testified that Michele wasn’t wearing any clothes and that a nearby bathtub was empty.

Michele never regained consciousness and was pronounced dead later that day. Mickelson’s testimony was part of MacNeill’s preliminary hearing, during which prosecutors are attempting to prove they have sufficient evidence to charge him with murder for her death. The hearing began last week and has included testimony from various experts, law enforcement officers and MacNeill family members. read more »