South Miami Facebook killer begins trial Tuesday
Derek Medina, the South Miami man who shot and killed his wife, then posted a photo of her bloody body on Facebook, will get his chance to convince a jury that he acted in self-defense.
Testimony will begin Tuesday morning after lawyers deliver their opening statements before the 12-person jury.
Dressed in a suit, Derek Medina, the man who killed his wife and posted a photo of the body on Facebook, right, appears in the courtroom for the start of his murder trial. On Monday, Derek Medina appeared in criminal court for a preliminary hearing of the start of his murder trial in Miami.
The trial begins more than two years after Medina drew worldwide notoriety when he shot and killed Jennifer Alfonso, 27, in the kitchen of their townhouse in August 2013.
"I'm going to prison or death sentence for killing my wife. Love you guys. Miss you guys. Take care. Facebook people you'll see me in the news," Medina posted on his Facebook profile, along with the photo.
Medina's Facebook post repulsed the public with critics calling the killing a symptom of a society obsessed with social-media-fueled fame.
The photo Medina posted on Facebook showed Alfonso, a Denny's waitress, wearing all black and pink socks, on her knees, twisted backward in a bloody heap. The images stayed online for hours before the site finally took it down amid the police investigation.
Medina has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder and faces life in prison if convicted.
According to prosecutors, Medina got into an argument with Alfonso in their kitchen, left upstairs, fetched his pistol and returned to confront her. Medina told Miami-Dade detectives that he disarmed her of a kitchen knife and returned it to a kitchen drawer before firing six to eight times.
"An execution," prosecutor J. Scott Dunn told a judge during a hearing in October 2013.
Medina has never denied shooting Alfonso -- he immediately turned himself in and admitted to the killing. But his defense team has portrayed him as a psychologically battered victim, the husband of an aggressive "diva" who longed to hurt him and called him "the woman" in their relationship.
He told police that he fired only after Alfonso "kept on punching me like crazy" near his temple or neck.
Alfonso's 10-year-old daughter was upstairs at the time of the shooting, and was not harmed.
After five days of questioning candidates, a jury was selected late Monday and sworn in before Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Yvonne Colodny.
This story was originally published November 10, 2015 at 6:54 AM with the headline "South Miami Facebook killer begins trial Tuesday ."