New York Trial in self-help expert's odd death heads to jury Deliberations to begin Thursday

By Jennifer Peltz Associated Press NEW YORK (AP) -- Prosecutors call it murder. The suspect says it was a suicide staged with a stranger's aid. Now it will be up to jurors on what to make of the strange story surrounding a motivational speaker's stabbing death. A prosecutor and a defense lawyer debated the parameters of assisted suicide Tuesday as they summed up the unusual case surrounding the 2009 death of motivational speaker Jeffrey Locker. Deliberations were set to begin Thursday after a break for the court to address other cases. The case against Kenneth Minor is a rare murder trial in which there's no dispute, at least among prosecutors and defense lawyers, that the slain man wanted to die and the defendant played a part in his death. The debt-strapped Locker approached Minor on a street to say he'd pay to be killed in what appeared to be a robbery so his survivors could collect as much as $18 million in insurance money, according to prosecutors, Minor and evidence presented at the trial. The 52-year-old Locker was found wounded in the chest, with his hands tied behind his back, in his car in East Harlem, miles from his suburban home. What the two sides disagree about, and what jurors will have to decide, is exactly what part Minor played in Locker's stabbing and whether it amounts to a crime. Prosecutors say the 36-year-old Minor stabbed Locker repeatedly, an account backed by testimony from a senior city medical examiner. The fact that Locker solicited help being killed doesn't matter, Manhattan assistant district attorney Peter Casolaro said in his closing argument. "Is the defendant an angel of mercy? No, he's the Grim Reaper," Casolaro said, depicting Minor as a streetwise figure who unabashedly carried out a killing for hire. While "causing or aiding" a suicide is considered a defense to certain murder charges under New York law, "isn't what happened here a lot different from what the law is talking about?" Casolaro asked jurors. Not at all, says Minor's lawyer, Daniel J. Gotlin. Minor says he only held a knife while Locker repeatedly lunged into it, a scenario that noted pathologist Cyril Wecht testified Feb. 24 was possible. Wecht is known for his work on such high-profile deaths as those of Elvis Presley and JonBenet Ramsey. Minor "felt sorry for this other human being who wanted to take his own life. He wasn't cruel and inhuman," Gotlin told jurors in his summation. "He's no contract killer," said Gotlin, who portrayed Minor as the victim of a smooth-talking professional speaker who lured him into his scheme not caring whether Minor might end up in prison. Locker's family has declined to comment. Minor, a one-time computer technician with a history of mostly drug arrests, was arrested after using Locker's ATM card -- his payment for accepting Locker's proposition, he and prosecutors say. If convicted, Minor could face life in prison. Published: Thu, Mar 3, 2011