Cowley County District Judge Jim Pringle admitted it’s won’t be easy deciding if he will admit wrenching testimony from women who say Justin Thurber followed them, harassed them and molested them for years before Jodi Sanderholm’s killing.
“This would make a law school professor lethal, licking his chops about what questions he could put on a law exam,” Pringle said of the 17 different decisions ahead of him.
Prosecutors are seeking to admit the testimony at Thurber’s capital murder trial, of what’s usually known as “prior bad acts.” Usually, that kind of testimony is inadmissible, but under Kansas law it can be permitted under certain circumstances.
Those include:
- If evidence shows a pattern of behavior consistent with the crimes being charged
- If it relates to an important aspect of a case.
- It is valuable in helping to understand a case.
Thurber’s public defenders argue the testimony isn’t relevant to Sanderholm’s death.