AKRON, Ohio (Court TV) — A young woman serving a possible life sentence for murdering her mother with a frying pan and knife won her appeal and will get a new trial.
Sydney Powell was sentenced to life in prison for murdering her mother, Brenda. (Ohio Dept. of Corrections)
Sydney Powell was convicted in 2023 on charges of murder, felonious assault and tampering with evidence for killing her mother, Brenda Powell, at her home. Sydney was 19 at the time of the murder and had been kicked out of school. She killed her mother while Brenda was on the phone with school officials. Sydney was sentenced to 15 years to life in Sept. 2023.
At trial, Sydney admitted to killing her mother but argued that she was having a mental health crisis at the time. Several doctors testified on her behalf, saying that she suffered from multiple mental illnesses, including anxiety, borderline personality disorder and schizoaffective disorder. The jury rejected the argument and found her guilty on all counts.
Immediately following her sentencing, Powell appealed her conviction. The appeal centered on four arguments, but in its decision, the appeals court focused on only the first: The trial court committed an error by preemptively barring the defense from presenting a surrebuttal case.
MORE | Sydney Powell, convicted of killing mom, claims prosecutorial misconduct
Before the trial began, Sydney’s attorney filed a motion for a surrebuttal, which was denied. At the close of the state’s rebuttal case, the defense renewed its request to call additional witnesses, but the judge again denied the motion, saying there had been “lots and lots and lots of expert testimony in this matter.”
While the Prosecution argued that there is no “absolute right” to a surrebuttal, the appeals court found that Sydney had a right to deliver one in this case.
Sydney’s defense of insanity is considered an “affirmative defense” in Ohio, which means that the burden is on the defense to prove that she was insane at the time of the murder. While defendants are never required to present evidence to prove their innocence, they must prove insanity if that is their argument in court. With that line of thinking, the appeals court found that the surrebuttal was, in fact, a rebuttal case for the defense’s case-in-chief, which they do have an absolute and “unconditional right” to present.
The appeals court noted the other arguments in the appeal, including allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, but said those issues were rendered moot by the decision to award a new case based on the error found in the first argument.
