A California mother who killed a retired nurse in an tried theft to scouse borrow cash to ship her daughter to cheerleading camp has been convicted just about a decade after the heinous homicide.
Cherie Townsend was once convicted of first-degree homicide on Thursday for fatally stabbing 66-year-old Susan Leeds 17 occasions within the neck and higher frame as she sat inside of her Mercedes-Benz SUV within the Peninsula buying groceries mall parking storage in huge sunlight on Would possibly 3, 2018, KTLA reported.
Prosecutors mentioned Townsend, 47, was once making an attempt to scouse borrow $2,000 to ship her daughter to a cheerleading festival in Florida and had long past to the upscale buying groceries prom in search of an “simple goal” to rob on the time of the homicide.
The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Division had first of all known the mom-of-two as a suspect and arrested her later that month, however she was once launched six days later when prosecutors mentioned there wasn’t sufficient proof to rate her.
Townsend — who admitted to being on the mall, however maintained her innocence — filed a lawsuit towards the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Division in October 2018, claiming false imprisonment, defamation, racial discrimination, and intentional infliction of emotional misery.
The swimsuit was once later brushed aside after she was once arrested once more in August 2023 for the homicide.
All the way through the trial, Townsend’s public defender, Elizabeth Landgraf, argued that there was once no direct proof tying her to the killing, akin to DNA, fingerprints, witnesses, or surveillance photos.
Alternatively, LA Sheriff’s Division criminologist Ilene Louie testified that strains of DNA on a cell phone discovered below Leeds’ SUV matched Townsend’s, the Los Angeles Instances reported.
Investigators first of all believed the telephone below the automobile belonged to the sufferer, however after powering it on, they discovered an image of Townsend.
Prosecutors offered proof indicating Townsend was once determined for finances to hide her daughter’s shuttle to Florida.
The mom-of-two had allegedly regarded as a GoFundMe however rejected the speculation, fearing it could embarrass her daughter, the Day by day Breeze reported.
Townsend additionally had texted her son’s former soccer trainer about getting a faux ID and Googled whether or not Walmart verified IDs for bank card transactions.
Leeds, a retired Kaiser nurse, had faithful her profession to taking care of sufferers with Sort 1 diabetes.
“Such a lot of lives had been impacted through this homicide,” Fred Leeds, the sufferer’s stepson, informed KTLA.
“She lived an ideal lifestyles…a sort human being that might have carried out anything else for any person, and to be so brutally murdered, there’s simply no reason behind it.”
Her stepson additionally shared that his father — Susan’s husband of 25 years — died in 2022 and not noticed justice served.
“The ultimate phrases from him to me had been, ‘My Susie didn’t deserve this,’” he recalled.
Townsend is ready to be sentenced on Jan. 23. She faces 26 years to lifestyles in jail.
