Detective Says Dally Asked About Wife’s Remains

A day before his wife’s funeral, Michael Dally asked two detectives a question they still remember: Was his wife’s head still attached to her body when it was discovered?

Dally, who is accused of killing his wife in a scheme with lover Diana Haun, posed the question two weeks after Sherri Dally’s decaying remains were found at the bottom of a ravine near Ojai, Det. Glen Young testified Wednesday.

“He wanted to know if we recovered a necklace when the body was discovered,” Young said.

Dally told authorities that his wife wore the necklace all the time and that she was wearing it the day she disappeared from the parking lot of a Target store in Ventura, Young said.

“Michael asked Det. [Jim] Burt and I if the head of his wife was still attached, and if it was still attached then the necklace should still be there.”

Young told jurors that authorities recovered a wristwatch and a wedding ring from the gully where Sherri Dally’s body was found.

But he said police never found the heart-shaped necklace that Michael Dally was referring to during their conversation June 14, 1996.

The gold necklace has emerged as a significant--though somewhat elusive--piece of testimony in the prosecution’s case against Haun, a 36-year-old grocery clerk. She and Dally are charged with murder, conspiracy and kidnapping in the death of Sherri Dally. The pair are facing separate trials.

During Haun’s trial, which began Aug. 4, prosecutors have called several witnesses to testify about the necklace. They even played a videotape of Sherri Dally wearing it while proudly recalling that Michael gave it to her one Mother’s Day.

Karlyne Guess, the victim’s mother, testified that before the funeral Michael Dally volunteered that he had Sherri’s necklace and wanted to put it on her urn. He later said he was trying to get it from police, she said.

Dally’s niece, Heather Murray, testified that she saw her uncle wearing one of Sherri’s necklaces after her aunt was missing. But Murray said she could not remember if it was a heart-shaped necklace.

On cross-examination Wednesday, Deputy Public Defender Neil Quinn asked Young how much Michael Dally knew about the condition of his wife’s remains, which were found scattered amid debris.

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Young said such specific information was kept from Michael Dally. He knew the bones were skeletonized but had not been shown photographs, Young said.

He also said that police were not aware of the existence of a necklace until Dally mentioned it to the detectives.

According to a report by the medical examiner, who is expected to testify today, a bone in the back of Sherri Dally’s neck was broken. And defense attorneys told prospective jurors during jury selection last month that there may be testimony during the trial about the victim’s head being severed.

In other testimony Wednesday, three Ventura police officers told the jury about items they found in Haun’s home as well as statements they overheard during wiretaps of her phone.

As prosecutors began to wind down their case--they only have 10 remaining witnesses scheduled--they called Cpl. William Dzuro back to the witness stand to identify items seized from Haun’s home.

Dzuro previously testified about the seizure of Haun’s electric typewriter during one of two searches on May 18 and June 18, 1996.

On Wednesday, Dzuro went through a list of items, including a blond wig, upholstery cleaner, trash bags, the address of the Ventura Target store, three books on witchcraft, the address of the British Consulate in Los Angeles and various photographs, including two of Haun with Michael Dally.

They also found a date book with “Cancun” noted on March 8, 1996. Previous testimony has established that Haun and Dally vacationed together in Mexico during the week of the Dallys’ March 6 wedding anniversary.

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Many of the items Dzuro identified that were shown to the jury allegedly link Haun to the kidnap-slaying, such as the Target store address and the trash bags, which were among the items that Haun purchased at a Kmart store.

She also bought a camping ax and a tan pantsuit, according to court testimony, items prosecutors allege were used in the abduction and killing of Dally.

But on cross-examination, Quinn showed that many of the items seized by police during the two searches were not those that authorities were looking for when search warrants were issued last year.

In a similar methodical listing, Quinn went through an inventory of things that police were supposed to look for in Haun’s home: a badge, handcuffs, a scarf, keys to Sherri Dally’s van, maps indicating a burial site, heavy pancake makeup, bloodstained clothes.

None of those items, Dzuro testified, were found in Haun’s home. Earlier, prosecutors presented evidence suggesting that Haun may have been the unidentified dark-haired woman who had purchased handcuffs and a security guard’s badge from a Ventura uniform store.

In addition to Dzuro, Officer Jeff Theis testified about a phone call Haun placed to her sister May 31, 1996, several weeks after Sherri Dally’s disappearance.

In that call, a recording of which has been played for the jury several times, Haun is heard telling her sister, Mary Oliver, not to discuss a subject they had talked about earlier.

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And before Oliver’s answering machine clicks on, Haun’s mother is heard in the background saying either: “You tell them you tell?” or “You tell them you kill?”

Sgt. Gary McCaskill also told the jury that on June 17, 1996, Ventura police received a copy of a letter that was also sent to The Times. The letter blames the disappearance of Dally and two other missing Ventura County women on British nationals.

Prosecutors allege that Haun composed the letter on her electric typewriter. Defense attorneys earlier said that no evidence exists to link the letter to Haun and unsuccessfully fought outside the jury’s presence to keep the document out of the case.

Judge Frederick A. Jones ruled that it could be admitted, and a copy of the so-called “British letter” was entered into evidence Wednesday.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

People vs. Haun

The Legal Pad

Oxnard attorney David L. Shain and Ventura attorney Richard Loy offer their take on the Diana Haun trial. They will rotate with other experts as the case moves forward. Today, Shain discusses the testimony of Cpl. William Dzurothe Ventura police officer who supervised two searches of Diana Haun’s home in Port Hueneme. Loy discusses the testimony of Dr. Nat Baumerwho said injuries to the defendant’s face appeared to be fingernail scratches and not scrapes from a bicycle accident.

DAVID L. SHAIN

Oxnard attorney

“It appears to me that what the prosecution did today was fill in the holes of testimony that came earlier in the trial by admitting this evidence. The jury actually got to see these items, to look at them, and to see how they were obtained. I think that’s the fundamental benefit . . . But I thought Deputy Public Defender Neil Quinn did a very nice cross-examination. His goal was to point out what police did not find during the search of her home and to show the innocence of the items that were found, such as cleaning supplies. It was sort of a classic cross-examination where there’s a search warrant involved and he did it well.”

RICHARD LOY

Ventura attorney

“The district attorney is trying to educate the jury through their expert, Dr. Baumer, in a way consistent with their theory of the case. And the defense, of course, is trying to show that the expert’s information can be consistent with another theory or inconsistent with the theory that the D.A. is putting forward . . . It’s obvious to the jury that the doctor is liked by the district attorney and was only called recently. But he has tremendous experience . . . It is clear that the district attorney was trying to show from the photo exhibit that this did not happen from a bike accident. But the defense showed with a later witness that even though the bicycle didn’t show tremendous damage it did show damage consistent with a glancing blow from an automobile.”

Compiled by Tracy Wilson / Times court reporter