Cynthia Sommers wants cause of death changed for record

Widow cleared of murder wants death certificate changed
By ALLISON HOFFMAN, Associated Press Writer

Friday, May 2, 2008


05-02) 00:53 PDT SAN DIEGO (AP) --

Cynthia Sommer has a death certificate for her Marine husband that lists homicide as his cause of death. Forensic experts said Todd Sommer was poisoned with arsenic.

But the lab results underpinning that finding were discredited two weeks ago, leading prosecutors to release the widow from jail more than two years after she was incarcerated for the supposed crime. Now, Cynthia Sommer wants the death certificate rewritten to show her husband wasn't murdered.

"What can they say, that I killed him with a hammer?" she told The Associated Press.

The San Diego County medical examiner's office won't say if it will change the cause of death. The district attorney's office says it may bring new charges if additional evidence is found but admits it has no case against the widow.

Sommer, 34, was convicted of murder in January 2007 after initial tests showed enormous amounts of arsenic in frozen samples of her husband's liver and kidney, despite concerns from the lab's own director and other experts.

With no proof that the widow was the source of the arsenic, prosecutors relied heavily on circumstantial evidence of her financial debt and later spending sprees, including wild parties she threw after her husband's funeral and breast implants paid for with his $250,000 life insurance payout.

Prosecutors told jurors Sommer was the only person with a motive to kill the Marine, but the linchpin of the case was always the arsenic: Without it, there was no physical evidence that Todd Sommer was even killed.

As prosecutors prepared for a second trial, ordered by a judge who ruled that Sommer received inadequate representation, they asked another lab to analyze previously untouched specimens. The samples had been embedded in paraffin wax and sealed in a drawer at a military morgue for six years.

The tests showed no traces of poison.

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