Defendant Chose Love Life Over Victims’ Lives : Courts: Woman already sentenced to death for one murder describes starting strangulation of Huntington Beach student at ex-convict’s request.

SANTA ANA — Cynthia Lynn Coffman testified Thursday that her relationship with a tattooed, motorcycle-riding ex-convict was more important to her than the lives of the three people she helped him kill.

The 30-year-old St. Louis woman, already sentenced to death for the sex killing of a woman in San Bernardino County, faces a second death sentence for a similar attack on a Huntington Beach college student, Lynel Murray.

In addition to the deaths of 20-year-old Corinna D. Novis, who was abducted from a Redlands mall, and 19-year-old Murray, who was kidnaped five days later from the dry cleaners where she worked, Coffman has admitted helping her ex-lover with the contract killing of a man in Kentucky.

The ex-lover, James Gregory Marlow, 36, has already been sentenced to death for the murders of Novis and Murray.

Under cross-examination Thursday, Coffman acknowledged that she initiated Murray’s strangulation in a Huntington Beach motel room on Nov. 7, 1986, but she denied her motive was sexual jealousy.

While out looking for a bank to use a stolen credit card, Coffman testified, “I thought he was back there raping her” in the shower, where she said she often had sex with Marlow.

Coffman said that Marlow had told her, “You’re going to do this one,” and when she said she could not complete the killing, he said, “You can and you will.”

Afterward, Coffman testified, “he said he was proud of me because I tried.”

Murray family members and friends wept as Coffman testified.

In low-key but persistent questioning by Deputy Dist. Atty. Robert C. Gannon Jr., Coffman described a relationship that was a combustible mixture of love, sex, abuse and fear.

When Gannon asked whether her relationship with Marlow meant more to her than the people they killed together, she replied, “Yes, it was more important. . . . It shouldn’t have been.”

Coffman said she allowed Marlow to tattoo her buttocks with the words “Property of Folsom Wolf,” his nickname.

Gannon led Coffman through some of her prison correspondence with Marlow, including obscene references to San Bernardino County jailers, sexually explicit writings and drawings and the letter “i” dotted with swastikas.

Coffman acknowledged that at various times she could have left Marlow, who claimed to be a member of the white supremacist group Aryan Brotherhood and a hit man, as she had left her husband and several other boyfriends. Gannon repeatedly suggested that Marlow’s appeal was sexual excitement, his outlaw image and his projection of power.

Although not legally wed, the couple had a “biker wedding” ceremony, and purchased a motorcycle with the proceeds of the Kentucky killing.

Coffman said her sexual relationship with Marlow “mattered a lot,” but that “I stayed with him because I loved him. . . . I wanted something different.”

During direct examination by her lawyer, Deputy Public Defender Leonard Gumlia, Coffman tried to explain Marlow’s continuing appeal, despite frequent beatings and one occasion when she said he extinguished a cigarette on her face.

“He made me feel special,” she said. “He was very protective of me. He made me feel loved.”

Repeatedly during the direct examination, as Gumlia catalogued the acts of abuse, he asked, “Did you still believe he loved you?”

On each occasion, Coffman answered softly, “Yes.”