Source: Grand Rapids Press, WOOD TV
[post updated at 7:26 pm PT with breaking information from WOOD TV]
Grand Rapids, Mich. -- A Kent County jury here has begun deliberations into whether Steven Scarborough is a robber and kidnapper who bludgeoned a 62-year-old man to death, or whether the 22-year-old defendant was being molested and wielded a baseball bat in self defense.
Closing arguments were presented in the first part of the day. Then jury began discussing the evidence presented around 2 p.m. Wednesday, and went home for the day around 5:30 p.m.
Defense lawyers said again this morning Scarborough acted in self-defense when he was sexually assaulted in the apartment by Victor Manious and that the robbery and cover-up were the friend's idea.
"(Scarborough) had every right to do what he had to do to ward off that attack," defense attorney Paul Denenfeld insisted again today in his closing argument. He claims that killing Manious was a reasonable response to the alleged sexual assault.
"Whether his memory of the number of blows is correct, he had the right to use as many as necessary to stop the sexual assault from continuing," said Denenfeld.
Prosecutors argued again in their closing statement to the jury that the two men met at a gay bar when Scarborough, visiting from Tennessee, asked Manious for a ride back to a friend's apartment. Once at the apartment, they say Scarborough assaulted Manious, robbed him, and -- with the help from a friend -- parked the victim's car with his body in the trunk on a downtown street.
Closing arguments took up the entire morning as Denenfeld restated his argument that Manious knocked his client out and when he woke up, the father and church leader was engaged in oral sex upon him.
He told the jury Manious was a closeted homosexual who had persistently pursued two other men the July weekend his wife and daughter were gone to a church conference. Denenfeld said Manious was desperate for male companionship and that was what led him to the Kalamazoo Avenue SE apartment where he hoped to meet up with Scarborough's Grand Rapids host, Justin Robinson.
Assistant Prosecutor Helen Brinkman said the defense is simply trying to divert attention and that Scarborough was not acting in self defense but instead lured Manious back to the apartment with the intent to rob the older man.
She said that theory is bolstered by the fact that soon after dropping off the body -- stuffed into a car's trunk and left on a downtown street, Scarborough activated Manious' credit cards. He then used those for shopping, dining and travel, include his flight to Texas, where he was eventually apprehended.
Scarborough faces up to mandatory life in prison without parole if convicted.
As the courtroom cleared for the day, the families of defendant Steven Scarborough and victim Victor Manious reacted to the day's events, as the case went to the jury.
Scarborough's family was crying quietly in a hallway. The Manious family was defending their patriarch.
Victor Manious' daughter Yustina fiercely defends her father. She said he was a religious man who knew right from wrong, did not have a secret gay life and would not have assaulted Scarborough.
"Just listening to what's being said about my father, it's too much," she told WOOD TV's News 8. "He would never, ever, ever hurt anyone. I know that."
"Victor has died," said Manious' brother-in-law John Fahd. "But we want to tell everyone his name is clear."
The jury will resume deliberations Thursday morning.
Full article: Update: Jurors begin deliberating fate of Steven Scarborough in death of Victor Manious | Grand Rapids Press
Scarborough case in jury's hands | WOOD TV