A woman who pleaded guilty to killing a man after fighting with him over a game of Monopoly was sent to prison Monday.
Cassie Robertson, 20, was ordered to undergo a 90-day diagnostic evaluation at the Utah State Prison. She will return on Sept. 14 when 3rd District Judge Michael Murphy will sentence her.Robertson and her husband, Jerry Lee Robertson, were both charged with bludgeoning Gerald B. Thomas, 56, to death with a claw hammer. The couple had apparently been living with Thomas and disappeared immediately after his death.
She pleaded guilty to murder, a first-degree felony, as part of a plea bargain with prosecutors.
Cassie Robertson's defense attorney asked Murphy to consider the 90-day evaluation so that he and the judge could find out more about her psychological profile. Manny Garcia said his client's husband was sexually, physically and psychologically abusive toward her and "may have altered her state of mind enough to allow her to participate in this (slaying)."
Garcia said Robertson was a runaway who had been living in and out of foster homes but does not seem to have traits that many killers do. "I think there's more we need to find out about her," he said.
Garcia also asked to have his client sentenced as if the charge were a second-degree felony, but Salt Lake County deputy attorney Howard Lemcke said he opposes such a motion.