A man whose efforts to defend himself against double homicide charges have been called a "train wreck" tried one last time yesterday to convince a jury he did not kill his parents.

Wearing dark slacks and a red tie, Neelesh Phadnis repeatedly perched the reading glasses he'd borrowed from the judge on his forehead and looked at the men and women inside the jury box.

"You guys," he said during closing arguments, "I mean, I hope you guys are sharp. I mean, I want to have children. I mean, I want to fall in love with a female. I want to have a happy life. I mean, my life is on the line here. I hope you understand that."

Phadnis, 24, is accused of fatally shooting his father and mother, Ravindra, 53, and Surekha Phadnis, 49, on Aug. 24, 2002, in the family's Avon Court home in Kent.

Phadnis, who has no legal training, insisted on defending himself against the two aggravated first-degree murder charges despite warnings from King County Superior Court Judge Helen Halpert and his former attorneys. He opted to act as his own attorney, he said, because he had "issues" with all four public defenders assigned to him.

David Roberson, Phadnis' most recent public defender who was assigned as standby counsel, said the trial has been a tragedy.

"It's a shame because he has no idea what he is doing, and there is obviously something wrong with him," said Roberson. "What can I say? It's not fun. It's like watching a train wreck."

Nevertheless, dozens of attorneys and other spectators have sat in on the two-week trial. "I've never seen anything like this," said one courtroom regular.

Phadnis claims he was kidnapped and tortured for three days by a gang of 400-pound Samoans who eventually killed his parents in front of him. At one point he tried to keep prosecutors from showing the jury a picture of one of his father's handguns by saying, "Your honor, that's not even the murder weapon," which implied that he had personal knowledge about the gun that was used in the killings.

Another time, Phadnis put his finger in his mouth, like a gag, to show jurors how he was supposedly silenced by the Samoan gang. He then proceeded to talk while his voice was muffled, making it difficult for jurors to understand him.

The number of people Phadnis claimed were involved in his parents' slayings, as well as their ethnicity, changed daily, according to Phadnis' testimony. One day, the gang was comprised of a handful of Samoans and their girlfriends. Later that same day, there were also two whites, a couple of blacks, one Native American and, perhaps, even one transgendered individual in the gang. By the end of the trial, Phadnis was saying there were more than 30 armed Samoans involved.

Phadnis, who frequently asked the judge and prosecutors for help throughout the trial, was allowed to walk around the courtroom, sit on the witness stand and speak freely during his defense.

Under cross-examination by Deputy Prosecutor Don Raz, Phadnis explained his calm demeanor after the slayings because he had "been trained all the way through junior high to stay calm when you deal with fire, crime, drugs and earthquakes." He then launched into a long discourse on how he learned to "stop, drop and roll."

Police and prosecutors said Phadnis was completely calm when he knocked at his neighbor's house late on the night of the slayings and asked to use the phone, saying he was trying to reach his parents. He left, returned a short time later and called 911.

Police said that when officers responded, Phadnis never said anything about a kidnapping or the slayings. Instead, he said he was too tired and hungry to talk and that they should "go home."

In addition, Phadnis said though he had seen someone fire a gun at his parents, he didn't realize they'd been hurt.

"You're telling me that you saw them come out, stand behind your dad and pull the trigger, that you heard the shot and saw blood, and that you didn't know they were injured?" Raz asked incredulously.

Phadnis said it didn't occur to him that his parents had been shot.

Phadnis has had several mental-health evaluations that determined he was competent to make legal decisions for himself. The Sixth Amendment guarantees a competent person the right to have an attorney, but also guarantees the person the right to waive the attorney and defend himself.

The jury began deliberations yesterday afternoon. If Phadnis is convicted of aggravated first-degree murder, he will spend the rest of his life in prison without the possibility of parole.

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/l ... sh07m.html

i like this guy. give him a tv show.

i believe him. Those Samonans are almost kidnapping people around here

I'm sorry, but thats hilarious.

This guy is so awesomely funny, words fail me. Possibly the only person in the world who can turn double homicide into great standup.

"Pshh. Thats not even how I killed them."

Jailarity ensues.

Is he available to represent others before he's given the chair?

Yeah, we need to get as much material as possible out of him before he goes away.

Follow Up:

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/9627973/

Kent man guilty of murdering parents; Neelesh Phadnis, who represented himself in court, will be sentenced to two life terms with no parole

by Noel S. Brady, Journal Reporter
The King County Journal

A Kent man who thought he could do a better job than four court-appointed attorneys at defending himself on charges he murdered his parents was found guilty Friday in King County Superior Court.

Members of the jury, who took approximately eight hours to reach their verdict, said Neelesh Phadnis's broken, often contradictory testimony and questioning of witnesses was self-defeating and highlighted his arrogance.

``He sounded very egocentric,'' said one man on the jury who didn't give his name. ``Everything was all about him and how he got beat up.''

From his opening statement in the trial, Phadnis repeatedly claimed that in August 2002 he was kidnapped and brutalized with fists, clubs, knives, a sword and a machete over three days by a band of ``400-pound Samoans,'' because they wrongly believed he had tried to burn down one of their homes.

He finally convinced them to release him with a 48-hour deadline to come up with $5,000 to pay them off, he said. But before the first day was over, they showed up at his parents' home in Kent and shot his mother, Surekha Phadnis, 49, and father, Ravinda Phadnis, 53.

After scrutinizing about 170 exhibits, including Phadnis's blood-stained clothes and letters he wrote to friends offering them money to silence witnesses in his case, the jury returned a verdict of guilty on both counts of aggravated first-degree murder.

The aggravating factor -- in this case that a gun was used and there was more than one victim-- means Judge Helen Halpert will have no choice but to sentence Phadnis to two life terms in prison with no chance of parole.

His sentencing hearing is scheduled for Nov. 8.

Another juror, who also chose not to be identified, said the 12-member jury was slightly divided early in deliberations with at least one juror disagreeing with the rest on the extent of Phadnis's guilt. After two votes, however, the entire jury reached the required unanimous verdict.

``One juror had some philosophical differences from the rest of us at first,'' he said.

Another juror, a nurse, said she lost confidence in Phadnis's alibi when he spoke of how he managed to outrun his attackers despite his fresh wounds, including a stab wound that punctured his lung, a broken nose, a broken jaw and several other stabs and lacerations.

Prosecutors could have asked for the death penalty in this case, but Senior Deputy Prosecutor Don Raz said his office decided against capital punishment for Phadnis because of his personality disorder and his history with child protective services as an adolescent.

Proof of motive wasn't required to find Phadnis guilty, Raz said, but prosecutors believe he might have wanted to cash in early on his inheritance.

Some speculate that his father's strict attitude and perhaps some degree of heavy-handedness toward his son might have had something to do with it as well.

Phadnis's uncle, Mohit Chitnis, was overcome by grief shortly after the verdict was read. He said he wasn't entirely surprised by the verdict, because Phadnis had been a troubled child long before his parents were killed.

Having sat through the entire trial, a couple who lived next door to the Phadnis family said they, too, saw the problems develop years before the shooting.

``Not from the night that we learned they were dead did we have any question who did it,'' said the man, who lived with his wife next door to the Phadnises.

The couple, who did not want to be identified, said Neelesh Phadnis had threatened his mother about nine months prior to the murders. She called Kent police, but they don't know what became of the report.

``He had been a concern for a number of years,'' the man said. ``You know, he's his own worst enemy. The dumbest thing he could've done is represent himself.''

Truth really is stranger than fiction. Unbelievable.

Did he pull out the "look over there it's a bird (runs away)" defence?

Can he still be declared "insane" and not go to jail? Maybe he's trying to pull that

All they need to prove is that he understood that what hwas doing was wrong, which is pretty easy to do when he's making up alibis with Angry Samoans (hehe) and whatnot.

The question we should be asking ourselves is what do we do when the angry samoans finally get their gang together and attack?

I'm afraid I don't find this very funny at all. This guy is obviously seriously mentally disturbed and should never have been permitted to conduct his own defense.

Bush shouldn't have been allowed to be president, but that doesn't make his attempts to run the country any less comical.

I am a lawyer, and I used three adverbs in a row in my last post.

Message board or not, I will now hold you to higher standards in every post I read.