Murderer’s appeal denied

PALMER — A state appeals court shot down another attempt by a mother convicted of murdering her son to have her case tried again.

Suzette Welton, 44, was convicted in 2002 and sentenced to 99 years in prison for a house fire that killed her 14-year-old son. The fire and events leading to it was the subject of a seven-week trial during which prosecutors argued she took out life insurance policies on both her sons prior to the fire. The day of the fire she slipped them sleeping pills then torched their Mulchatna Drive home, prosecutors said. One son died, the other escaped.

Since her conviction, Welton has been unsuccessfully appealing to have the conviction overturned. At the same time, she filed what attorneys call a motion for post-conviction relief.

That motion was the subject of multiple hearings in Palmer before Superior Court Judge Eric Smith. Welton argued two things — that her trial attorneys prevented her from testifying and didn’t prepare her to do so and that the attorneys didn’t adequately question her surviving son.

Explaining the basis of the first claim, appeals court judge David Mannheimer wrote, “Welton acknowledged that, at her trial, when the trial judge asked her personally if she wished to testify, Welton answered ‘no.’ Welton testified that she gave this answer because one of her attorneys, Gregory Heath, instructed her to say ‘no’ in answer to the judge’s inquiry. Welton testified that she had no idea that she had the right to say ‘yes.’”

Every other witness who testified in Smith’s hearing disagreed with Welton’s assertion. The trial also contained a lengthy back-and-forth between Welton and the judge designed to make certain Welton knew it was her decision and that she’d made it on her own.

Based on that, Smith denied Welton’s claim. And Mannheimer and the appeals court backed him up.

Welton’s second claim, about her attorneys questioning her surviving son, hinges on one main fact — the sleeping pills.

“The attorneys incompetently failed to cross-examine Jeremiah with a statement he made to a police officer during a pre-trial interview — a statement in which (the son) admitted using sleeping pills to help him sleep when he had soccer practice,” Mannheimer wrote.

That statement contradicted what he said at trial — that he’d never experimented with sleep aids.

But the defense at trial called its own witness, a friend of the boy, who said he’d seen him take sleeping pills and had even seen the son who died use them. Defense attorneys testified at the hearings in Smith’s courtroom that the friend was a surprise witness and bringing up the son’s statement to police would have tipped their hand as to what the friend would say.

“Judge Smith concluded that, despite the existence of this prior statement, (Welton’s trial attorney Gregory) Heath’s approach to this issue remained competent. The record supports that conclusion,” Mannheimer wrote.

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.