MURDER VICTIM’S VIDEOTAPED DEPOSITION SECURES HER KILLER’S
CONVICTION

Ohio mom Judy Malinowski’s beyond-the-grave videotaped
deposition testimony played a pivotal role in convicting her former boyfriend,
Michael Slager, of her murder. The presiding judge ruled in April that
Malinowski’s videotaped deposition was admissible at trial, but just two days
before jury selection was set to begin, Slager pled guilty to murder in
exchange for prosecutors taking the death penalty off the table.

Though both prosecutors and defense attorneys attended the
deposition, and defense attorneys were given advance notice and able to
cross-examine Malinowski, they attempted to cite a legal technicality to
prevent the deposition from being admitted in their client’s murder trial.

On August 2, 2015, Slager and Malinowski were arguing
outside of a gas station when Slager doused her with gasoline and set her on
fire. She was burned over 90 percent of her body and doctors expected her to
die within days, but she lived for nearly two years before succumbing to her
injuries.

In January 2017, her deposition was taken via
videoconference, with prosecutors and defense attorneys in a courtroom and
Malinowski in her hospital bed.

In the deposition, Malinowski described how Slager poured
gasoline on her while she was on the ground of the gas station parking lot,
starting at her head and continuing down to her toes. “The look on his
face was pure evil,” she said.

She recalled crying for help and how the gasoline tasted in
her mouth and the terror she felt as Slager opened his lighter and the gasoline
ignited. It felt “like a thousand hot needles,” and said she “just
prayed to Jesus to please forgive me for my sins and to take care of my
children.”

Malinowski died in June 2017, and Slager’s attempted murder
charges were upgraded to aggravated murder. Slager’s attorney, Mark Collins, said
his client has always maintained that the fire was an accident but that he pled
guilty because his defense believed there was a “significant risk” he
would receive the death penalty if he went to trial, because Malinowski’s
testimony is “that disturbing and that powerful.”

A sentencing hearing was held July 5, at which Malinowski’s
friends and families testified. Slager was then sentenced to life in prison
without the possibility of parole.