Live blog: Emotional final arguments mark Jason Young trial

NBC-17 is live blogging the murder trial of Jason Young in Wake County Superior Court. Here are Thursday's developments. You can also follow on Twitter at #jasonyoung.

5:16 p.m.: Prosecutors and defense attorneys clashed in front a jury in dramatic fashion Thursday after four weeks trial, and five years of preparation, in the murder trial of Jason Young in Wake County Superior Court.

Defense attorney Mike Klinkosum led off, telling the jury to “do your duty” and find Young not guilty of murdering Michelle Young on Nov. 3, 2006.

Klinkosum ticked off 10 points as to why Jason was not the killer, emphasizing to the jury the lack of blood or fiber that tied him to the scene.

Defense attorney Bryan Collins followed, again pushing that there was not enough evidence for a conviction.

“You can’t find any evidence of guilt when your suspect is not guilty,” Collins told the jury.

But after a forceful presentation for the defense, prosecutor Becky Holt rose to a vigorous close, speaking in animated and forceful tones before the jury and pointing to a chart of the Hampton Inn in Hillsville, Va.

She said Jason had a plan to murder Michelle, and waited years to tell his story. The reason, she said, was so he could see the evidence the state had and “concoct” a story to fit that.

Jason, she said, was a salesman by trade who “could manipulate the facts to suit his purposes. Don’t let yourselves be manipulated in this case.”

And Howard Cummings concluded the emotional day, showing the jury the dolls the Youngs’ daughter, Cassidy, had used on the playground to illustrate “mommy” getting a “spanking.”

The only verdict, he said, is murder in the first degree for Jason Young.

The jury returns to the courtroom Friday at 9:30 a.m. to hear instructions from Judge Donald Stephens.

5:04 p.m.: Prosecutor Howard Cummings wrapped up the state’s case Thursday afternoon, closing his arguments by telling the jury the pieces of the case led to a conclusion that Jason Young murdered his wife Michelle on Nov. 3, 2006.

Cummings told the jury that this was no robbery, no sexual assault, no sign of forced entry.

“This was the time the defendant was waiting for,” Stephens said.

Michelle’s wedding ring was missing and never found, but also never claimed on insurance.

Cummings referred multiple times to the fact that Michelle was beaten more than 30 times.

“Thirty blows? Thirty blows? That’s not from a stranger,” Cummings said.

“That’s from a mad, mad domestic abuser.”

Cummings pushed the jury to consider Jason Young’s behavior on Nov. 2 and Nov. 3, 2006.

When Jason was told Michelle was dead, Cummings said, “there was no disbelief,” no calling someone to confirm.

 “It’s because he knows what’s happened,” Cummings said.

He said Jason “would not even listen to law enforcement.”

And after he sees the mother of his brutally murdered wife, “What does he say to Linda? Did he say, I loved your daughter?

“No. He says, ‘I’m going to take a hit on the house.’”

Cummings said he asked Shelly Schaad, “Will the will hold up?”

And his close friends drifted away from him, Cummings said, because they were no longer comfortable around him.

Cummings said the murder probably went astray because Cassidy was in the home.

“Maybe Cassidy woke up. Maybe Cassidy saw what happened,” Cummings said.

“Maybe that’s why visitations with Linda and Meredith were supervised.”

“It’s not just about what he said. Think about the way he said what he said.”

“You’ve listened to the way he controlled her, the way he berated her.”

He pointed out that Jason had a pair of size 12 Hush Puppies, like the prints on the floor of the bedroom. And he said other pieces of evidence pointed to Jason Young being the killer of Michelle.

“Take all the pieces” and put them together, he said.

“At the end of that, the picture will be quite clear that this defendant murdered his wife on Nov. 3.

“The state asks you to find him guilty of murder in the first degree.”

4:04 p.m.: After two strong presentations by the defense, prosecutor Becky Holt delivered a blistering rebuttal, laying out the prosecutions case in a powerful presentation before the jury.

"This case is solved,” she began, adding that it was solved “beyond a reasonable doubt.”

She talked about how the pressure had been building in the Young home, with the holidays coming and Jason not wanting Michelle’s mother to be in the home

“Financially, when the new baby came, they needed Linda’s help. Michelle was happy about that,” Holt said. “She was close to her mother and happy about her coming to live with them to help with the child care or live nearby to help with that.”

But issues between the two were “heating up.” Going to the Schaad’s wedding in Winston-Salem, she said, Jason told his friend Josh Dalton, “I am done.”

“Josh Dalton told you he understood he was done with the marriage,” she said. “He was mad, He was angry. And he said, ‘I’m done.’”

And she said Dalton remembered Jason tell him at one point, “I can’t divorce her. She’ll move to New York and take Cassidy.”

In the weeks that followed, Michelle met with a therapist, and the two had a counseling session with Meredith Fisher. At a dinner that final Saturday at Lucky 32, Meredith recalled Michelle telling her, “At least he’s trying.”

“But it doesn’t last long,” Holt said. “By the next week, by Wednesday, Michelle says, “He threw the remote at me. We are right back where we started. We made no progress.’

“And what does Michelle say to Meredith? ‘I’m done.’”

Holt noted that the defense pushed that the state lacked evidence and had only proved Jason was “a jerk.”

“The state has presented to you the facts of the case, the facts of where Jason Young was in his relationship at the time of  Michelle’s murder,” she said. “The state does not ask you to convict Jason Young of first-degree murder because he engaged in extramarital sex, because he had an affair.

“The state is not asking you convict Jason Young because he is a jerk but because the evidence shows you that when he made a statement 1,693 days after Michelle’s murder, was that what he said was that he loved his wife, that maybe the fact that he is having an affair with Michelle Money, that he is having intercourse with Carroll Anne Sowerby, that he gives a statement that he loves his wife, that maybe you should consider that about his honesty. Not only his honesty to Michelle but in his honesty about what’s going on.

“In the fall of 2006, he is writing Genevieve Jacobs Cargol by email, saying she was the love of his life or is the love of his life, always has been, always will be.

“It is a pressure cooker. Jason Young is in a marriage he didn’t want to be in. He’s in a marriage that resulted from the fact that Michelle became pregnant with Cassidy. He doesn’t want to live that life. He doesn’t want the responsibility.

“He  certainly doesn’t want his mother in law moving in and pointing out his shortcomings.

“It is not the life that Jason Young is willing to live any longer.”

As for Michelle, she said, Michelle was “worn down.”

“She was sad. She had to make some decisions.”

Holt mocked much of Jason’s story. She questioned why he claimed he wanted to by Michelle a Coach purse long after their anniversary.

“Does that make sense? Or in light of what you now know, was that part of the plan? The plan to leave those papers to have an excuse for Meredith to go over to the house?”Holt asked.

She then went through his story from the Hampton Inn, as explained in the first trial.

“He tells you before he actually goes outside, as he is leaving his room, he doesn’t want the door to make a loud noise when it shuts and that you actually have to pull it. He describes how that noise bothers him.

“That’s the reason he gives for holding that door and not letting it shut all the way.”

Then he propped open the emergency door.

“Isn’t it interesting that that’s when that camera is unplugged?” she asked.

He had testified that he wanted to get a USA Today from the counter to check sports scores.

“Does that make sense?” she asked, her voice incredulous. “He’s in a room with a television, with wireless Internet and computer? And what he says he wanted to get a newspaper to get sports scores?”

She also focused on his testimony that he smoked a cigar outside, despite a long disdain for tobacco use.

“What you know in this case from his friend Josh is he had never seen him smoke a cigar or a cigarette,” Holt said.

“Well, what else do you know? You know from this investigation it was about 30 degrees that night. He had just come in an hour before that. And then he had gone back out.

“Not only was it 30 degrees outside but the wind was blowing 20 miles per hour, gusting to 30 miles per hour. …

“But that’s the defendant’s statement. After he has access to the police reports. After he has access to the video. After he knows he is caught on camera walking to that exit.

That’s his story. Your reason and common sense should call foul.”

She argued that Gracie Dahms Calhoun, a key witness, was being truthful when she testified she saw Young around 5:30 a.m. in King, N.C. Calhoun’s testimony is essential because it places Young between Raleigh and Hillside the night of the murder. 

“He was mad, he was frustrated, and he made a scene,” Holt said. “And she remembered him.”

Staring at the jury and learning forward with strength in her voice, Holt concluded by saying, “Ladies and gentlemen, do not convict Jason Young of first-degree murder because he is a jerk. Convict him because the circumstances in this case show that there was a plan.

“There was a plan when he left those eBay papers. There was a plan when he called Meredith. There was a plan when he went to the hotel and left himself a way to come back and avoid the cameras.

“There was a plan when he didn’t shut his room door all the way.

“And that plan was to murder his wife. He was done. He was out. And he was taking care of the situation.

“He could manipulate the facts to suit his purposes. Don’t let yourselves be manipulated in this case.”

1:39 p.m.: Defense attorney Bryan Collins followed Mike Klinkosum before the jury in the Jason Young murder trial Thursday, continuing the prosecution’s argument that the state had failed to prove its case against Young.

For five years, he began, the state has searched for evidence without finding anything that connected Jason to scene of Michelle Young’s murder.

“You can’t find any evidence of guilt when your suspect is not guilty,” Collins said.

He noted that Jason Young left multiple electronic records of his activity on Nov. 2 and 3, 2006, but that from midnight until 7:40 a.m., the record is silent.

“You don’t leave evidence when you are asleep,” he said, underscoring the defense’s contention that Jason was in bed at the Hampton Inn in Hillsville, Va., when Michelle was  killed.

He pushed hard to smash holes in the prosecution’s theories.

He noted that there was no murder weapon, and attacked the wrongful death suit filed by Linda Fisher.

“All that is is Linda Fisher suing Jason Young for money on behalf of Cassidy’s estate. She does that by accusing him of killing Michelle,” Collins said.

“Jason decided not to participate – ‘I’m not playing that. I’m not answering your lawsuit.’”

Jason later gave up primary custody of Cassidy rather than be deposed in the lawsuit.

Collins sought to soften that blow by saying, “Jason did not give Cassidy away. Jason is still Cassidy’s father.”

He said Jason knew he likely would not prevail, since there was still the chance of criminal charges against him.

“He was sitting around wondering when or if law enforcement agents would be taken to jail,” he said.

He noted that were footwear impressions in the bloody bedroom that matched shoes Jason had. But, like defense attorney Mike Klinkosum earlier in the day, Collins argued that  Jason was not necessarily wearing those shoes.

“It could have been the Orbitals but they weren’t necessarily on his feet,” he said.

The prosecution will go before the jury later Thursday afternoon. Jason did not testify in the second trial but he did in the first.

Collins sought to anticipate the prosecution’s arguments by saying it wasn’t important whether Jason had every fact right in his earlier testimony.

“I urge you to listen up if they say Jason lied about something in the first trial,” Collins said.

Remember the context, Collins said. Jason had spent a year and a half in jail, and years waiting to see if he would be charged. In that long span of time, some details could become unclear to him.

“Use your own common sense to tell yourself what that really means,” Collins urged the jury.

"Getting details wrong", Collins said:  “That’s natural. That’s human. That doesn’t mean anything.”

He also addressed how Jason did not discuss what happened, even to his mother. His friends have testified that they told him to get a lawyer on Nov. 3, and Jason followed their advice.

“If you do [talk to police], they get to ask questions – ‘What did your son tell you?’ They can do that to your own mother. He got good advice, advice a good lawyer would give to an innocent man,” Collins said.

He used a Power Point presentation to show Jason’s movements on Nov. 2 and Nov. 3 in North Carolina, Virginia and back.

“All of this is confirmed by cell phone towers, by video, by receipts,” he said.

Using those maps, he said Jason’s Ford Explorer would not have had the gas to drive the miles the state’s contended.

Finally, he argued that the fact that Cassidy was found cleaned up – hours after her mother’s brutal murder – indicated that the murder didn’t happen in the middle of the night – between around 2:30 and 3:30 a.m. – as the state contends in its timeline.

“Somebody cleaned that child and that somebody was not Jason Young. That was not possible,” he said.

He also said there was no way Jason worked with an accomplice to commit the crime and the jury should seriously question that if the prosecution raised that theory.

“If they argue that, think to yourself, is there any evidence of that at all? That borders on the ridiculous,” he said.

“There aren’t any unexplained telephone calls. There aren’t any unexplained texts.

“There probably were at least two people who killed Michelle Young. But one of them wasn’t’ Jason.”

He closed with some other important points, again hammering on the state’s lack of hard evidence.

“Where is any physical evidence whatsoever that points to him?” he said.

And what of Cindy Beaver’s testimony that she saw a car in the Youngs’ driveway that morning?

 “Her testimony cripples the state’s case. And they know that,” he said.

“What they are doing to Jason Young is wrong,” he told the jury. He reminded them that prosecution represented the government, not the entire state, and that they represented the population of North Carolina.

 “You don’t owe your government anything except to follow the law,” he said.

“You have ample evidence before you that Jason Young is not guilty.

“The law says if you are not fully satisfied, if you are not entirely convinced, it is your duty to find Jason Young not guilty.”

He said no one will ever know what happened, but there was “reasonable doubt” that Jason Young did not kill Michelle.

“Please. Do your duty and find Jason Young not guilty,” he said.

12:10 p.m.: Defense attorney Mike Klinkosum argued to the Jason Young jury Thursday that there were “at least 10 circumstances” showing why Jason did not kill his wife, Michelle, on Nov. 3, 2006.

In a thoughtful, but forceful, tone, Klinkosum outlined the defense and why Jason would be found not guilty:

Reason 1: Klinkosum pointed out that Michelle was brutally murdered, but there were no scratches or bruises on Jason.

“There was a fight in this bed room. … and you also heard about scratch marks on her neck. Whoever did this had their hands around Mchelle Young’s throat, and you heard about scratch marks on her neck …,” Klinkosum said.

“You also heard that four days after this happened the City-Count  Bureau of Investigation pulled Mr. Young and stripped him naked, stripped him naked, and photographed and him, and there was not one mark on that man except for one bruise on his big toe.

“You saw the pictures of his hands. They were pristine.”

Michelle, he said, had been “clawing” at her attacker.

“She fought back,” Klinkosum said. “But there were no scratches on Mr. Young, no bruises on him.”

Reason 2: Klinkosum pointed to the blood evidence.

“Not one drop of blood was found on Jason Young or found anywhere he had been,” Klinkosum said.

He said police had “scoured” Jason’s car and hotel room at the Hampton Inn in Hillsville, Va.

“Not one drop of blood anywhere,” he said.

He pointed out that law enforcement could not find any blood on his clothes after seizing his luggage.

He pointed out that Cassidy Young was clean when she was found the next day. “Shockingly clean – that’s what was said,” Klinkosum said.

If that’s the case, how did Jason have time to drive to Raleigh, kill Michelle, clean up Cassidy – and get back to western Virginia, where his cell phone hit a tower at 7:40 a.m.?

“There’s simply not enough time for that,” he said.

“How is it that that dog did not go in there and lick her face and try to arouse her, try to see what was wrong?” he said.

Reason 3: He pointed out that there was “no fiber transfer” from the Hampton Inn hotel to the home in Raleigh.

Reason 4: He said investigators found DNA on Michelle’s jewelry box that did not match Jason Young.

“That’s the key, ladies and gentlemen,” he said.

“It’s some unknown person.”

Klinkosum called the master bedroom “almost like an inner sanctum of a home.”

“Typically friends don’t go in the master bedroom,” he said. “That’s where you and your spouse or people in your immediate family are allowed to go. But there was DNA on the jewelry box that does not match [Jason or Michelle].

“There is something not right about this crime scene, ladies and gantelemen.”

Reason 5: Fingerprints.

“There are unidentified prints all over those eBay papers,” he said.

He said the prosecution wanted the jury to believe that could be a law enforcement official, and yet they never checked to see if they matched.

Reason 6: The phone calls. He pointed out that Jason made several calls that night and that those he called said he sounded normal.

“That is not the mind of a man” thinking about a murder, he said.

Reason 7: Klinkosum pointed out that Jason Young was on his telephone at 11:11 p.m. on Nov. 2, 2006. But the camera at the Hampton Inn was moved at 11:20 p.m.

“He had all of nine minutes to case out this hotel and figure out which camera to unplug,” Klinkosum said.

And yet there were no other photos of Young in the hotel in that time frame.

“It makes no sense. It makes no sense at all,” Klinkosum said. “This case has never been properly solved and Jason did not kill Michelle Young.”

Reason 8: He addressed the shoes with prints that match Jason Young, but said the killers could have put those shoes on.

“Those may have been Jason Young’s shoes, Jason Young’s Hush Puppies, but it wasn’t his feet wearing them,” he said.

Reason 9: Jason Young’s closets were “rummaged through.”

"Why is that," Klinkosum asked, "if he knew what was in his closets?"

Reason 10: He said the “entire investigation” was the 10th reason that shows Jason Young was not guilty.

“From the moment this investigation started, they focused like a laser on Jason Young,” he said, “so much so that when he was coming back from Brevard his friends, his friends who were being questioned knew from  the line of questioning that the sheriffs department was after him

“They said, ‘You better get a lawyer because they are coming after you.’

“So after that, it took off.”

He also compared the testimony of Gracie Dahms Calhoun and Cindy Beaver. He said that law enforcement officials believed Calhoun because her testimony fit their timeline.

“I am not accusing her of lying,” Klinkosum said of Calhoun. “Soemthing happened to her. Someone threw a 20 [dollar bill] at her and cussed her and upset her. But it wasn’t Jason Young.

“Why if he went to the lengths commit this crime, would he go in and make a scene in front of a live witness?”

Finally, Klinkosum said “Jason himself” wasn’t the type to plan and commit the murder.

“He’s been a jerk. He’s a philanderer. He’s a womanizer. He has said grossly inappropriate things and has done grossly inappropriate things,” Klinkosum said. “But that doesn’t make him a murderer.”

"Jason", he said, “could not plan out this murder, pull it off, without any evidence left behind in his car or his hotel room or somewhere. There is no physical evidence linking him to this murder, ladies and gentlemen.”

In summary, Klinkosum said, “There is plenty of reasonable doubt in this case. The evidence points to the fact that Jason Young did not commit this crime. He did not do this…”

He also said Michelle’s second child was planned, and wondered why Jason would have killed not only Michelle but the baby.

“It makes no sense. Why would he do that?” Klinkosum said.

“Think about why you are here. Think about why all of you are sitting here. In our society, we don’t send people to jail, we don’t put them in prison for the rest of their lives, because we hate them.”

It’s only done, he said, when the evidence goes beyond “a reasonable doubt.”

He asked the jury to take a “long, hard look” at the evidence.

“There is only one verdict in this case that is just and that is fair, and that is to find him not guilty,” Klinkosum said

10:36 a.m.: Defense attorney Mike Klinkosum began his closing argument with a passionate defense of Jason Young.

“It is a natural human reaction” to want to punish someone, Klinkosum told the jury, especially when someone as beautiful as Michelle Young is killed.

"But that natural reaction, ladies and gentlemen, is one of the reasons we have juries, so that 12 people, 12 people detached from the sitaution, can look at the evidence and determine if the person who has been accused actually committed the crime

Ladies and gentlemen, Jason Young did not kill Michelle Young and their unborn son and this case remains unsolved.

“There is no direct evidence linking Mr. Young to this crime.”

Klinkosum said the prosecution will present “circumstantial evidence,” but told the jury that was not enough.

“Look at the circumstances in this case. Look at them hard,” Klinkosum said. “Jason Young did not commit this crime, he could not have committed this crime, and the wrong man stands accused.”

10:27 a.m.: Judge Donald Stephens has given attorneys for each side three hours to argue their case, he told the jury Thursday morning as they prepared for closing arguments in the murder trial of Jason Young.

Stephens said the defense will go first, with Mike Klinkosum leading off and Bryan Collins following. Becky Holt will go first for the prosecution, followed by Howard Cummings.

“This is a really important part of the trial,” Stephens said. “You’ve heard four weeks of testimony. It’s their opportunity to tell you what is significant or not and to tell you how it fits together or doesn’t fit together.”

The purpose, Stephens said, is to help the jury fully understand the position of each side.

“Please give them your careful attention,” he said.

The closing arguments will begin after the jury reviews one final piece of evidence – the Internet history from Jason Young’s home computer.

9:50 a.m.: Closing arguments are expected today when the Jason Young murder trial resumes at 10 a.m. in Wake County Superior Court.

The first trial ended in a hung jury in the summer, forcing a re-trial that is now in its fourth week.

The prosecution took a different approach in many ways this time, focusing more heavily on evidence and less on some of Jason Young’s bawdy behavior and volatile relationship with his wife, Michelle.

Michelle was murdered in their Raleigh home on Nov. 3, 2006. Jason claims he spent that night in a Hampton Inn in Hillsville, Va., and has no knowledge of who killed her.

Young testified in the first trial at the very end, surprising the prosecution. He said pictures that showed him in the lobby of the Hampton Inn around midnight were taken as he went outside to smoke a cigar.

He said he used a twig to prop open the exit door, smoked a cigar and came back inside.

The prosecution has pounced on that theory, with witnesses saying they could never remember Jason smoking. The defense countered with his mother testifying that she found a humidor in their home after the murder.

Prosecutor Becky Holt gave closing arguments for the prosecution in the first trial, pointing out that Young waited years to explain himself and his actions that night.

Mike Klinkosum gave the closing arguments for the defense. Klinkosum conceded that Young had acted like “a jerk” but argued Young was not involved in the murder and that the case remained unsolved. Klinkosum echoed that argument in opening statements in the second trial.