stephen s life who also swayed the jury. terry scofield recounting what stephen said to her weeks before jody s death. that his stress would soon be over. that was something that pushed me towards what we decided in the end. it was the light bulb. to them it wasn t jody who slipped but her husband, with that menacing statement. they believed it wasn t just a fall from the cliffs, it was a cold-blooded execution. stephen scharf was sentenced to life in prison. he says the jurors condemned him not on the facts but for his and jody s tumultuous open marriage. so you think this was a moral judgment on the part of jurors? yes. and i suppose some people would say, well, he was punished for his moral weakness. but this is a murder trial. but for rescuer michael chiofi it s a fitting end to a story that s haunted him since
that possibly she was telling everyone if something happens to me it s my husband. and it was another woman in stephen s life who also swayed the jury. terry scofield recounting what stephen said to her weeks before jody s death. that his stress would soon be over. that was something that pushed me towards what we decided in the end. it was the light bulb. to them it wasn t jody who slipped but her husband, with that menacing statement. they believed it wasn t just a fall from the cliffs, it was a cold-blooded execution. stephen scharf was sentenced to life in prison. he says the jurors condemned him not on the facts but for his and jody s tumultuous open marriage. so you think this was a moral judgment on the part of jurors? yes. and i suppose some people would say, well, he was punished for his moral weakness.
picture of someone who frankly is furious about this divorce. no one person ever indicated that my client was furious over this divorce. they had talked about divorce for years. maybe she was, you know, saying one thing and not following through. oh it is true stephen scharf did not want a divorce, he says he wanted to give the marriage another chance. and as for that former girlfriend, terry scofield, she recounted stephen s mysterious statement just before jody s death. just give me to the end of september and everything will be okay. the stress will be a lot of the stress will be gone. the defense attorney says that was stephen s clumsy way of trying to dump his girlfriends. and speaking of which, he added, those other women did not bother jody at all. she was seeing other people herself.
the beach over that labor day weekend. he was under a lot of stress, and the stress would be resolved by the end of september. two weeks later jody scharf was dead. terry now sees that cryptic statement in a dreadful light. i was like oh, no, the end of september, and then the light bulb went off immediately. it also went off for marian hilferty. in perhaps the most chilling testimony of the prosecution s case, hilferty told the jury that when she heard her friend was gone she immediately remembered something jody said just weeks earlier. she said that during this conversation i have with him if anything happens to me you ll know who did it. she said, you ll know it was him. the prosecutor s position was clear. a husband with a motive. the perfect setting. the violent intent to kill his wife. or was there another way of look
my mom was driving, and my dad just hitting her with the bottom of his fist. and i was begging him to stop doing it. he also remembered the last day of his mother s life. he was 10 and said his mother told his father that she didn t want to go out with him alone. she said, if i wanted to go out with you, i wouldn t be divorcing you. but where was the proof that stephen had planned to kill jody that night? well, there was the hammer in the picnic bag. but there was also testimony from this woman, one of stephen s old girlfriends. i even mentioned to my girlfriend that it was a perfect relationship. terry scofield had been dating stephen months before jody scharf s death. did mr. scharf tell you whether or not he was married? actually, he said he was not married. and she remembered something strange stephen said to her on