McEnroe jury to continue deliberation Monday on murderer’s sentence: death penalty, or life

SEATTLE — A King County jury tasked with deciding whether convicted killer Joseph McEnroe should be condemned to death will continue its deliberations on Monday.

The 12 jurors began deliberating Thursday morning.

The same jury convicted McEnroe in March of six counts of aggravated murder after a two-month trial. That finding resulted in a “penalty phase” trial to determine his punishment. McEnroe faces either life in prison without possibility of parole, or the death penalty.

McEnroe and his former girlfriend, Michele Anderson, were arrested in December 2007, shortly after the bodies of her parents, Wayne and Judy Anderson; her brother Scott and his wife, Erica; and the younger couple’s children, Olivia, 5, and Nathan, 3, were found on Wayne and Judy Anderson’s rural Carnation property. The six were killed Dec. 24, 2007, as they gathered to celebrate Christmas.

During the trial, McEnroe claimed he’d been coerced to kill by Michele Anderson, saying she believed her family had wronged her and that her brother owed her money.

McEnroe’s defense attorney, William Prestia, said in his closing argument Wednesday that McEnroe had adopted his girlfriend’s paranoid delusions.

“Joe’s fragile personality made him susceptible to Michele,” Prestia told jurors.

McEnroe told the jury he personally killed Wayne, 60; Judy, 61; Erica, 32; Olivia; and Nathan. He also shot at Scott, 32, though that slaying is believed to have been committed by Michele Anderson, according to trial testimony.

McEnroe told jurors he killed Olivia and Nathan because “if they weren’t already corrupted, they would be by this (witnessing the murders). The only decent thing to do was to free them.”

Michele Anderson will face a jury trial this fall. If convicted, she, too, faces a potential death sentence.