{"id":18984,"date":"2017-07-17T23:03:00","date_gmt":"2017-07-18T06:03:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/spijue.wpengine.com\/news\/murder-suspect-opts-to-represent-himself-at-retrial\/"},"modified":"2017-07-17T23:03:00","modified_gmt":"2017-07-18T06:03:00","slug":"murder-suspect-opts-to-represent-himself-at-retrial","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/news\/murder-suspect-opts-to-represent-himself-at-retrial\/","title":{"rendered":"Murder suspect opts to represent himself at retrial"},"content":{"rendered":"

Homicide suspect Christopher D. Strawn will represent himself when his case heads back to trial, currently set for October.<\/p>\n

Strawn still faces charges of first- and second-degree murder, manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, third-degree assault and weapons misconduct in the 2015 shooting death of Brandon Cook. His first trial abruptly ended in a mistrial in February.<\/p>\n

<\/a>[Judge declares mistrial in trailer park killing]<\/a> <\/ins><\/p>\n

Strawn, 33, opted to “fire&rdquo; his court-appointed attorney, Eve Soutiere, late last month, and has asked for standby counsel to be appointed to assist him. A reason for the requested dismissal was not given in open court.<\/p>\n

His trial currently is set to start Oct. 2 and the prosecutor, Assistant District Attorney Amy Paige, has indicated she opposes any continuance. A status conference has been scheduled for July 25, with a trial call set for Sept. 22.<\/p>\n

Strawn is accused of shooting Cook “execution style&rdquo; <\/a>on Oct. 20, 2015, as he helped friend Tiffany Marie Albertson paint the kitchen in her trailer in Kodzoff Acres Mobile Home Park on Mendenhall Loop Road.<\/p>\n

Police found Cook dead on the kitchen floor with a gunshot wound to the back of his neck and head, according to a police officer&rsquo;s report.<\/p>\n

Albertson described the shooting to Juneau Police Department officers as completely unprovoked. She reportedly said she heard a loud bang and saw Cook drop to the floor, and saw Strawn about 10 feet away holding what she described as a short-barreled shotgun with a pistol-style grip.<\/p>\n

Soutiere had successfully called for the mistrial in Strawn&rsquo;s case after his ex-girlfriend — who had specifically been cautioned against making any references to domestic violence — blurted out a reference to the barred testimony.<\/p>\n

Juneau Superior Court Judge Philip Pallenberg agreed, ending a trial that was already in its second week.<\/p>\n

Pallenberg subsequently denied a motion by Soutiere that argued for a permanent end to any criminal prosecution of Strawn due to double jeopardy.<\/p>\n

\n

• Contact reporter Liz Kellar at 523-2246 or liz.kellar@juneauempire.com.<\/b><\/p>\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Homicide suspect Christopher D. Strawn will represent himself when his case heads back to trial, currently set for October. Strawn still faces charges of first- and second-degree murder, manslaughter, criminally negligent homicide, third-degree assault and weapons misconduct in the 2015 shooting death of Brandon Cook. His first trial abruptly ended in a mistrial in February. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":107,"featured_media":18985,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_stopmodifiedupdate":false,"_modified_date":"","wds_primary_category":4,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-18984","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18984","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/107"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18984"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18984\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18985"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18984"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18984"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18984"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=18984"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}