Saturday, January 23, 1999
Vanover convicted of killing boyfriend
Mother of 4 spared death peanlty
BY DAN HORN
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Throughout her murder trial, Melissa Vanover's attorneys said the young woman had ruined her life with one bad choice after another.
A jury decided Friday that no choice was worse than the one she made last June when she shot and killed her boyfriend.
A sobbing Miss Vanover heard the Hamilton County jury pronounce her guilty of aggravated murder in the death of Michael Nieman.
Although she faces 23 years to life in prison, the verdict spared the 27-year-old mother of four a possible death sentence.
The jury convicted Miss Vanover of theft but acquitted her of aggravated robbery — the charge that made the trial a death-penalty case.
If she had been convicted of the most serious charge, she could have become the only woman on Ohio's death row.
Mr. Nieman's daughter, Nikki, said she deserved nothing less.
“She shot my dad in the back. She plotted the whole thing,” Miss Nieman said after hearing the verdict.
“She deserved the death penalty.”
Defense attorneys, however, said the verdict suggested that the jurors had listened carefully to evidence describing Mr. Nieman as an abusive, jealous man who routinely threatened Miss Vanover.
They said the shooting occurred after Mr. Nieman vowed to murder the father of Miss Vanover's children.
They said Miss Vanover, who wept often during the two-week trial, was disap pointed with the guilty verdict but relieved the conviction did not carry a possible death sentence.
“This was a very long wait,” said Elizabeth Agar, one of her attorneys. “It was very stressful to sit up there and not know what the jury was thinking.”
The verdict suggests the jury was convinced Miss Vanover planned the shooting but not as part of a plot to rob Mr. Nieman's house.
Prosecutors had argued that she called another boyfriend, Kevin Green, after the shooting so he and several relatives could help her ransack the Miami Township home.
Police arrested them all a day later with $350,000 in cash and jewelry that was taken from the house.
“They didn't see her as being a participant in the robbery,” said defense attorney Steve Wenke, who spoke to jurors after the verdict. “There was not enough evidence to show intent to commit robbery.”
Assistant prosecutor Gerald Krumpelbeck commended the jury for its work but said he remains convinced robbery was the motive for the murder.
He also said the jurors may have been influenced by the defense's repeated attacks on Mr. Nieman, who was described as a possible criminal.
“The defense tried to trash Michael,” Mr. Krumpelbeck said. “Obviously, they succeeded to some extent.”
In her closing arguments, Ms. Agar said Mr. Nieman's history was crucial to the case. She said he tormented Miss Vanover even as he gave her money, jewelry and an apartment.
She said Miss Vanover, a former stripper with abusive boyfriends in her past, was afraid to leave Mr. Nieman even after he shot at her in his house.
Mr. Nieman's daughter said Miss Vanover made up those stories in an attempt to justify her actions.
“My dad is my best friend and I got robbed of him,” Miss Nieman said. “She robbed me of him.”
Miss Vanover will return to Common Pleas Court on Feb. 1 for sentencing before Judge Thomas Nurre.
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