LOS ANGELES – An actress shot to death at Phil Spector’s hilltop castle was the last of several women victimized by the legendary music producer in a decades-long series of alcohol-fueled confrontations, a prosecutor told jurors Wednesday as they began hearing the murder case.
Deputy District Attorney Alan Jackson’s opening statement made it clear the case against Spector in the death of Lana Clarkson will rely heavily on the testimony of other women dating to the 1970s.
Jackson outlined what he called a pattern of behavior in which Spector would become exceedingly drunk, take a woman to one of his residences, refuse to let her leave and then threaten her with a gun when she refused to stay.
“The evidence is going to paint a picture of a man who on February 3, 2003, put a loaded pistol in Lana Clarkson’s mouth – inside her mouth – and shot her to death,” Jackson told the nine-man, three-woman jury.
Spector, 67, whose “Wall of Sound” recording techniques transformed rock ‘n’ roll in the 1960s, lives in a rambling castlelike mansion in suburban Alhambra. It was there that he took Clarkson, who wound up dead in the foyer with a gunshot through her mouth.
If convicted of second-degree murder, Spector could face 15 years to life in prison.
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