Four years of frustration and anger erupted in a Salt Lake courtroom Wednesday as the mother of a murder victim attacked her daughter's confessed killer.
"You . . . animal! You killed my daughter! You (expletive deleted)! You . . . animal!" Lorraine Martinez shouted, digging at the face of Roberto V. Arguelles.Stunned prison officers jumped on the woman's back as Arguelles, shackled at the feet and handcuffed, ducked his head. He made no effort to stand up or run.
Arguelles admitted last April that he abducted and brutally murdered Lisa Martinez, 16, Tuesday Roberts, 15, Stephanie Blundell, 13, and Margo Bond, 42, while on parole in 1992.
Two years later, Arguelles led investigators to the skeletons of Martinez and Roberts buried beneath the ditch of his stepfather's West Salt Lake pig farm. One of the bodies showed evidence of death by a sharp-edged instrument.
"Go easy on her," Arguelles said as officers and court bailiffs led the mother from the courtroom. Later, he told guards that he was worried about the woman.
"I care about what happens to her. I'm the one that hurt her family," he said.
Arguelles was not injured in the attack but did lose some strands of hair.
Martinez made her move as prosecutor Kent Morgan con-clu-ded his closing argument about why Arguelles' legal defenders should be excluded from the case.
The woman, about 5 foot 2 inches tall and 140 pounds, jumped from her second-row seat, pushed through the short swinging doors that separate attorneys from observers and went for Arguelles' head.
She ended up tugging on the collar of his prison-issue jumpsuit while two prison transport officers pulled at her. Two Salt Lake County deputy sheriffs joined the melee moments after it began. They came from other areas of the courthouse.
"It's a good thing she didn't have a gun, that our security prevented that. It could have gotten ugly," said Lt. Larry Marx, who supervises security at the courthouse on 400 South.
Marx said he wishes he could post bailiffs in every courtroom in the building, but state officials have only funded 68 percent of the total cost. County leaders will have to pay an extra $600,000 this year just to maintain current bailiff levels despite state law that requires the Administrative Office of the Courts to fund security.
Arguelles earlier told 3rd District Judge L.A. Dever that he planned to plead guilty as charged and would have done so earlier had prosecutors not moved to disqualify his lawyers.
Morgan maintains legal defenders have a conflict of interest because an investigator who works for them was once a detective who investigated Arguelles for the rape and attempted murder of two teenagers in 1980.
Prosecutors plan to call the investigator at the sentencing phase of Arguelles (if he is convicted) to testify about his demeanor during a confession to the crimes.
Court rules state such a situation could be a conflict of interest and cause for reversal of a conviction if it is not handled properly.
Defense attorneys Karen Stam and Vernice Ah Ching responded that no such conflict exists and the state's motion is only a "ruse" to get them off the case.
The judge is expected to issue a written ruling within 14 days.
Meanwhile, Morgan said he would not personally pursue assault charges against Martinez for her courtroom attack.
"I can certainly understand how she can feel that way. I certainly have a lot of compassion for her," he said. "No one has come to me to seek charges and I won't do it myself."
Arguelles faces the death penalty if convicted. He told the Deseret News in May that he wants to die for his crimes.