On Wednesday afternoon, before the medical examiner took the stand for a long day of difficult testimony, the judge warned the jury that they will be seeing some "clearly disturbing photos."
Before the medical examiner began or the autopsy photos were shown, Dr. William Petit, who survived the attacks on his family, left the courtroom as Carver prepared to take the stand. A week ago, Petit sobbed when jurors were shown photos of his daughters' bodies. After court on Wednesday he called it "another tough day."
Connecticut's medical examiner described a painful smoke inhalation death likely suffered by an 11-year-old girl killed along with her mother and sister in a 2007 home invasion.
Wayne Carver testified Wednesday in the trial of Steven Hayes. Hayes is one of two men charged with murder, sexual assault and other crimes in the deaths of Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her daughters Hayley and Michaela.
Carver said soot in Michaela's lungs and air passages showed she died from breathing smoke after the men set fire to her home, and likely had a painful, panic-stricken death.
Hayes told police that he and Joshua Komisarjevsky had planned to break into the Petits’ house, tie people up, take their money and leave as fast as they could, according to testimony in court on Tuesday.
But, as Hayes has reportedly told police, “things got out of control.”
When fire responders arrived at the Petit home, they found three people dead. The house that had been burned to the ground. Dr. William Petit was the only survivor of the attack.
Detective Anthony Buglione said on Wednesday that Hayes was alert and coherent as police questioned him about the Cheshire home invasion.
"There was no emotion I would describe it as being flat,” Buglione said.
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Hayes told the detective that he and Komisarjevsky had met a year before, at a halfway house where they attended Alcoholics Anonymous together.
Buglione testified that Hayes told him: "My life sucks." He had no money, barely enough to eat and his mother had given him until the end of the week to use the car.
Buglione said the story of how he Komisarjevsky met up before the crimes varied, but Hayes told police he called "Josh" and said he was desperate. Komisarjevsky asked how serious and Hayes said very.
The two men were in Komisarjevsky’s mother’s van when they ended up in neighborhood, walked up to the backyard yard of house, saw light coming from the back porch and man asleep on porch.
They entered through the basement and searched for money before the violence began, according to testimony.
