Huguely trial expected to move into new, complex phase

The murder trial of George W. Huguely begins its second week this morning, and expert testimony is expected to focus on conflicting medical conclusions regarding what caused University of Virginia student Yeardley Love's death.

With a national audience looking on, not to mention a 14-person jury evenly split between men and women, prosecutors will call on the state medical examiner's office to explain how Love, a 22-year-old senior just weeks from graduation in May 2010, died of injuries that Huguely tearfully told police seemed insignificant.

Huguely, now 24, was apparently intoxicated when officers picked him up about five hours after friends discovered Love's unresponsive body lying face down in her bed about 2 a.m. May 3.

Huguely said he'd only seen a nose bleed after a raucous confrontation with "my former girlfriend" that included pushing and shoving, as well as a distraught Love banging her own head into her bedroom wall.

Investigators, though, described in court last week finding the bruised and bleeding lacrosse player from Cockeysville, Md., and immediately assumed a violent end to the young woman's life. Huguely admitted to police that Love had angrily ordered him away, fending off his apologies and entreaties to make up after Huguely broke through her locked bedroom door. He initially told police the door was open. The confrontation in her bedroom lasted about 10 minutes, he told police.

The drama expected inside a Charlottesville circuit courtroom this week and the likely complexity of conflicting medical evidence in the case could leave media representatives from around the country and other observers scrambling for help.

Scores of exhibits, including a crucially important diagram of Love's bedroom and pictures of her battered face and the crime scene, were not viewable by anyone other than jurors, the judge and lawyers in the case, a situation that will continue this week in the context of intricate autopsy and medical details. Much of the testimony is only barely audible because of a weak sound system, the courtroom's bare walls and high ceiling, and because witnesses face the jury but away from the public seating.

After a critical question of a witness, spectators, including three rows of supporters of the Love and Huguely families, tend to lean forward en masse to hear. .

"You can only hear bits and pieces, and not seeing the exhibits is just critical. The crime scene photos are just so important," said Josephine Mysliwski, 21, who is a student at Virginia Commonwealth University and aspires to be a prosecutor. She's been attending the trial, driving each day from Richmond, and is among the first people in line each day.

Large exhibits — a comforter and the door Huguely broke through — are evident, but pictures and documents are displayed on a projector whose screen faces away from the public and is out of camera range.

Nor will court officials release the proper names of witnesses; lawyers in the case are barred from talking with the media, even to explain factual details that may have been muffled by the sound system or courtroom noise.

Charlottesville Commonwealth's Attorney David Chapman told jurors last week that the medical evidence in the case will show that Love, who was intoxicated, died of blunt-force trauma.

But defense lawyer Francis McQ. Lawrence told jurors that Love died of "positional asphyxiation," a condition that some liken to sudden infant death syndrome. Lawrence's evidence is expected to assert that efforts to resuscitate Love created deposits of blood in her brain suggestive of trauma; he has said also that Love's heart may have faltered from a mixture of alcohol and prescription drugs.

Lawrence drew from investigators last week that there were no marks or indentations on Love's bedroom walls that would suggest something banged against them.

Love and Yeardley had been sparring for months over accusations of infidelity by each and over decisions about what would happen after graduation: Love was headed to New York and Huguely to San Francisco.

Witnesses last week described Love breaking into tears after Huguely held her in a chokehold during a party and in another incident. Huguely told police Love had battered him with a purse out of jealousy.

Days before Love died, Huguely had sent her an email, saying, "I should have killed you," a reference to when he first discovered she'd seen someone else.

Love responded: "You should have killed me?" ending the message cursing Huguely as "all (expletive) up."

As jurors watched Huguely's videotaped interrogation by police and his sobbing, heaving denials of killing the young woman, though, some jurors openly wept.

What wasn't clear is whether jurors felt sorry for Love or for Huguely or perhaps the tragedy of two lives — both with the world seemingly at their beck and call — lost.