May 16, 2008

Man convicted in wife's stabbing death

BAY AREA NEWS GROUP

A Daly City man accused of stabbing his wife to death tried to convince a Superior Court jury that the woman was already dead when he happened upon her bloody body in the couple's bedroom.

But jurors announced their disagreement Thursday, bringing Quincy Norton Sr.'s five-week jury trial to an end with a unanimous guilty verdict of first-degree murder.
The jury also found Norton, 33, guilty of a special allegation that he used a knife to murder his wife Tamika Mack Norton, a 31-year-old registered nurse. Her body was discovered in the bedroom of the couple's Daly City apartment on July 22, 2006.

Norton, who sat quietly in a pale yellow shirt as he awaited the jury's verdict, leaned toward his defense attorney after the court clerk read the 12 guilty verdicts and asked, "What does that mean?"

According to San Mateo County Chief Deputy District Attorney Steve Wagstaffe, it means Norton will face up to 26 years to life in prison.

The jury had spent six days deliberating the decision, and once the verdict was delivered, members of Tamika Norton's family flooded the courthouse hallway, many of them crying with joy over the verdict and with sadness over the loss of Tamika.

The jurors, who took six days deliberating their decision, declined to comment on the proceedings.

But prosecutor Al Giannini praised the jury as "very conscientious" and their verdict as "appropriate." Norton is a "very, very dangerous man," he added.

The prosecutor had told the jury that Norton murdered his wife because she had informed him she wanted to end their marriage.

Tamika Norton had filled out paperwork for a divorce less than two weeks before she was murdered, according to the owner of a San Mateo divorce center who testified for the prosecution.

Quincy and Tamika Norton's relationship was tumultuous, marked with numerous fights, breakups and reconciliations, according to various witnesses who testified at the trial.

Additionally, the prosecution called on testimony from women who had dated Norton to tell jurors that he was jealous and violent with them.

Ultimately, the case against Norton rested on the testimony of the Nortons' two young sons, Giannini said. Quincy Norton Jr., 11, and Dion, 9, told jurors they heard their mother scream their names the morning she died, and that there was lots of banging coming from the apartment's master bedroom.

"The two boys' testimonies were critical, because however plausible (Norton's) story was about what happened that day he couldn't explain the boys' statements," Giannini said.

Norton, who took the stand in his own defense, said the boys were describing a fight that occurred the morning before Tamika Norton was killed.

Defense attorney Patricia Fox told jurors that the boys were not "lying" but simply "unreliable" as witnesses.

Norton's alibi was that he spent the night before the murder at a friend's house - a woman by the name of Anirtra Johnson, with whom Norton fathered a daughter - and that he didn't arrive at his own apartment until later the next day.

He indirectly suggested that Johnson may have been responsible for Tamika Norton's death by saying the two women often fought and threatened each other.

Fox, Norton's defense attorney, made a point of publicizing the fact that Johnson's DNA evidence was found near the scene of the crime.

But forensic scientists testifying for the prosecution said that Norton could have inadvertently transferred the woman's DNA there.

Fox declined to say whether she believed that Johnson is Tamika Norton's killer, but the lawyer maintained her client's innocence.

"I am disappointed and surprised in the verdict," said Fox, adding that she plans to file for a new trial because she was "somewhat constrained in the presentation of the case."

The defense attorney said her case was affected by inadmissible evidence but she declined to comment on the specifics of that evidence.

Norton, who remains in custody without bail, is expected to return to Superior Court on July 7 to be sentenced.

Wire reports contributed to this story.