It was another look into the perplexing mind of Joseph McEnroe. The defense team trying to save his life in the death penalty phase of his murder trial read from his journals on Monday. It was a combination of love, hate, fear and loathing.
"My family betrayed me," he wrote. "My friends are all liars. (Michele) is all I have. There's nothing more dangerous than a man with nothing to lose."
Convicted of the killings of 6 members of his then-girlfriend Michele Anderson's family on Christmas Eve 2007, McEnroe's attorneys are trying to save him from death row by painting him as a mentally ill weakling who was controlled by the abusive Anderson.
He testified that she routinely spoke about wanting to kill people, even members of her own family.
"She had a lot of anger and a lot of hatred," he said. "She thought the best way to act on that would be to go off and kill people, to get them to respect who she was."
McEnroe's journals detail what appear to be Anderson's paranoid delusions, her belief that nearly everyone was out to get her, especially her brother and parents.
"She was convinced that some people's role was to be killing, and the reason she was having such problems in her life was because she hadn't killed people," he said.
McEnroe said he came to believe those delusions, as well, adding that it "never occurred" to him to seek help for Anderson. He testified that he kept her homicidal urges at bay for years by reasoning with her. Finally, though, her patience ran out.
"She was like, 'look we are in danger. These people are coming to attack us.' And I actually believed it. It hadn't even occurred to me until a couple days ago that it was crap."
When asked by his attorney why he didn't just leave Anderson as she grew more dangerous and erratic, McEnroe replied, "I thought she needed me."
