The Akron Legal News

Man who killed his wife in front of children loses appeal

ANNIE YAMSON
Special to the Legal News
Published: February 4, 2016

The appeal of a man who brutally murdered his wife in front of their children was overruled by a panel of three judges in the 9th District Court of Appeals last week.

Glenn Wong argued that his convictions for aggravated murder with prior calculation and design, aggravated felony murder, murder, kidnapping, felonious assault and domestic violence from the Summit County Court of Common Pleas were against the sufficiency and manifest weight of the evidence.

Wong also claimed that his right to due process was violated because he was prevented from presenting an insanity defense.

According to case summary, on the morning of Feb. 24, 2013, Wong stabbed his wife, Tami Wong, 103 times with a kitchen knife while their two young children watched.

The older child, 11 years old at the time, called the police and reported that her father was “murdering (her) mom.”

Multiple officers who responded to the scene found Wong laying on top of his wife on the floor of their master bedroom.

Before she died from her injuries, Tami told the police that Wong had attacked her while she was in bed. Wong admitted to the murder multiple times.

A jury found Wong guilty on all charged counts and he was ultimately sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole.

Appealing from that judgment, Wong claimed that there was insufficient evidence that he acted with prior calculation and design, acted knowingly or restrained Tami’s liberty. The appellate panel found otherwise.

Writing on behalf of the court of appeals, Judge Donna Carr first noted evidence that Wong came to the Twinsburg Police Department on Feb. 9, 2013 and inquired about hiring a private investigator to follow his wife because he believed that she was having an affair.

Officer Jeremy Vecchio advised Wong that the police department could not help, suggested that he hire and attorney and stated that it would be best for Wong to leave the marital home.

Wong, however, stated that he “was going to stay and try to work it out with his wife,” according to Vecchio’s testimony.

Fifteen days later, the Twinsburg Police Department received the 911 call in which Wong’s daughter stated that her father was murdering her mother.

According to the daughter’s testimony, she and her 9-year-old brother were watching television when Wong emerged from the master bedroom, walked into the kitchen and then walked back to the bedroom. Shortly thereafter, she heard Tami screaming “call 911.”

The son also testified at Wong’s trial, stating that he stood in the doorway of the master bedroom with his sister as she called the police.

In a recording of the 911 call, which was played for the jury, both children screamed that Wong had a knife and the son could be heard screaming that Wong was “sticking it into her.”

Wong was calm and cooperative when the police arrived. While he was being treated for lacerations to his fingers at a hospital, he admitted to a nurse that he “stabbed (his) wife about 7 a.m. this morning.”

After he was read his Miranda rights by and investigating detective, Wong again admitted the stabbing.

“The jury heard evidence that Wong stabbed Tami at least 103 times and that she died as a result of the enormous amount of blood she lost over an extended period of time,” Carr wrote. “The jury could have concluded that Wong had time to consider his actions during the course of the murder and could have stopped stabbing Tami prior to killing her.”

The appellate panel held that Wong had “more than a few fleeting moments of deliberation” before the stabbing. It specifically pointed to evidence that Wong went into the kitchen to retrieve a knife before returning to kill his wife and that, two weeks prior to the murder, Wong had told a police officer that he believed Tami was having an affair, indicating that the marriage was strained.

“Viewing all the evidence in a light most favorable to the state, we cannot conclude that the state failed to meet its burden of production on the element of prior calculation and design,” Carr wrote.

The court of appeals also ruled that Tami’s liberty was restrained, despite Wong’s claim that she was “moving about” during the attack, and that the state was not required to prove that he acted knowingly in order to prove kidnapping.

“The attack was long and brutal and Tami suffered an extensive amount of defensive wounds, evidencing that she tried to fend off Wong for some time while he continued to stab her,” Carr wrote. “A rational trier of fact could have concluded that Wong acted with the specific intention of causing Tami serious physical harm.”

The appellate panel held that sufficient evidence supported Wong’s convictions and, because he failed to set forth an adequate manifest weight argument, it also ruled that the jury did not lose its way when it found him guilty of the offenses.

Wong proceeded to argue that he was prevented from putting forth an adequate defense because the trial court did not allow his expert witness, Dr. John Fabian, to testify to an insanity defense.

Dr. Fabian, however, did not find that Wong was legally insane - meaning he did not understand the wrongfulness of his acts - at the time of the murder.

At a hearing on the admissibility of Dr. Fabian’s testimony, he opined only that Wong had developed a “jealous and persecutory paranoid type” delusional disorder. But the doctor could not state, within a reasonable degree of psychological certainty, that the disorder had caused Wong not to know the wrongfulness of his actions.

“Because Dr. Fabian would not testify that Wong was legally insane and his testimony was the only evidence upon which Wong relied in support of his insanity defense, the trial court did not abuse its discretion when it precluded him from testifying,” Carr wrote.

The court of appeals ultimately ruled that Wong’s appeal had no merit and it affirmed the judgment of the Summit County court.

Judges Beth Whitmore and Carla Moore joined Carr to form the majority.

The case is cited State v. Wong, 2016-Ohio-96.

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