Crime & Safety

Jury Selection For Lake Elsinore's Suitcase Killer Expected This Week

Joseph David Dorsey could face 57 years to life in prison if convicted in the August 2012 slaying of 47-year-old Christine Stewart.

Jury selection could get underway as early as tomorrow for the trial of an ex-con accused of killing a Hemet drug counselor with whom he was living and stuffing her body in a suitcase that he dumped in a motel room.

Joseph David Dorsey could face 57 years to life in prison if convicted in the August 2012 slaying of 47-year-old Christine Stewart.

Dorsey, 28, was arrested late last October in Playas de Rosarito, where he was located by Mexican authorities with the help of the FBI. He's being held in lieu of $5 million bail at the Robert Presley Jail in Riverside.

Find out what's happening in Lake Elsinore-Wildomarwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

Riverside County Superior Court Judge Mark Mandio is slated to hear pretrial motions in the case tomorrow morning at the Southwest Justice Center in Murrieta. The first panel of prospective jurors may be summoned to Mandio's courtroom in the afternoon for questioning as to their qualifications and availability.

Opening statements could begin before week's end.

Find out what's happening in Lake Elsinore-Wildomarwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

During a videotaped interview that sheriff's Detective James Merrill recorded when he spoke to Dorsey shortly after the fugitive was brought back from Mexico, the defendant admitted attacking his girlfriend of two years when she said "something" that set him off a few minutes after the two finished having sexual intercourse at his Lake Elsinore apartment. (Click here for more on the videotaped interview: http://lakeelsinore-wildomar.patch.com/groups/police-and-fire/p/lake-elsinore-man-gives-grisly-accou...)

The tape was played by Deputy District Attorney Burke Strunsky during Dorsey's preliminary hearing in February.

"I mean we were in bed and we were laying there and we started arguing," the defendant says during the interview. "I can't for the life of me remember even exactly what words she used. But the next ... I mean, it was like that (snapping his fingers) and I had her pinned to the bed by her throat. It was like it wasn't even me."

Dorsey told the detective that he choked Stewart until his "hands hurt" and then grabbed a phone cord and strangled her with it.

Merrill asked the defendant whether the woman attempted to fight back, noting that she had bruises on her body that indicated a struggle, but Dorsey replied that he had no recollection of Stewart resisting.

"She couldn't even speak," the defendant says on the tape. "I think it was more she was just trying to breathe."

Dorsey told Merrill that even though Stewart hadn't died by the time he wrapped the phone cord around her neck, he  "couldn't go back" and stop the attack.

"It was like something inside of me was telling me, 'OK, look, you have already done it. Now you have to follow through,"' he said during the interrogation.

According to the defendant, Stewart survived even after he used the phone cord, so he went into the bathroom, filled the bathtub and plunged her head underwater "until she stopped moving."

According to the defendant, he found a roller-wheel suitcase in his closet and stuffed Stewart's body into it, then drove to a motel with the remains.

The defendant triggered a manhunt after Stewart's body was found in a room at the Poway Best Western last Aug. 8. The victim, a behavioral health specialist at a drug rehab center, had been reported missing from her job two days earlier.

The 5-foot-2, 100-pound Canyon Lake woman's remains were located by motel employees who took possession of the defendant's personal effects when he failed to check out, according to prosecutors.

Court records show that the parolee was convicted in 2006 of assault and battery on a peace officer, for which he was sentenced to three years in prison.

Dorsey was also convicted last June of attempted burglary. According to court records, he originally was charged with burglary and grand theft in that case, but under a plea agreement, the two felony charges were dropped and replaced with the lesser count, resulting in a one-year prison sentence.

With credit for time served in jail and additional state credit to minimize prison overcrowding, Dorsey was allowed to go free. –City News Service

 




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