The trial for former student Isaac Campbell continued on Nov. 14 with the main detective retelling the events during the search of Campbell’s apartment.
Campbell is being charged in the slaying of Liya “Jessie” Lu back in 2007. Campbell’s friend Michael Darby found her body when Campbell had asked him to store a trash container at his house. After being unable to lift the plastic bag inside the trash container, Darby opened it and found Lu’s mummified body buried under kitty litter. Because of its mummified state, an autopsy to find out her cause of death remained inconclusive, however prosecuting attorneys believe she may have been killed by a martial arts sleeper hold.
According to Detective James Just of the San Gabriel Police Department, Campbell’s behavior was not normal and that he was “concerned, but not overly concerned.”
Before consenting to a search of his apartment, Just said that Campbell gave his mother, Lana Morales Campbell, “the longest hug he had ever seen.”
Campbell had also become increasingly agitated during the search of his car and exhibited “fire flight” behavior where it seemed as if he was searching for an escape route.
Investigators found a green purse in Campbell’s apartment containing proof of Lu’s employment at Kaiser Permanente as well as two bags of Orange Diesel marijuana in the hidden tire compartment of his vehicle.
During cross-examination, Public Defender Jim Duffy asked as to why Lu’s friend, George Molina, had been ruled out quickly as a suspect.
According to Duffy, Molina was jealous of Campbell and Lu’s relationship and that he was angry because he believed that Lu was using him to move her television into her new apartment. Detective Just also recalled that Molina wanted a relationship more than just a friendship.
At the trial on Nov. 21 the prosecuting team presented recordings of detectives interrogating Campbell on Lu’s disappearance weeks before the discovery of her body.
In the recordings, Campbell described Lu as having two separate personalities: wanting to be cared for and pampered while around Campbell, and being completely independent around others. She was also described as the jealous type who would pick fights with Campbell about girls who would walk around campus with him.
“She would accuse me of cheating on her constantly,” Campbell said in the recording, “but it wasn’t really a big deal. She’d get over it.”
When asked if the two ever had a physical fight, Campbell said Lu would strike him, but he wouldn’t fight her because “she was petite.”
Police also questioned Campbell on the days leading up to her disappearance, but Campbell said he couldn’t remember because he had been to busy studying for nursing classes at PCC. In fact, before meeting up with investigators, Campbell said that he had just taken a final at PCC and wanted to go back to find out his results.
The recordings also caught Campbell’s mother in the fray as she showed up at the police station. She described Lu as a workaholic who was hard to get in contact with because of her busy work schedule and also as someone who can easily be influenced by alcohol.
“[Liya’s] a naïve little girl,” Lana Campbell said in the recording, “If she was in the wrong place a the wrong time and under the influence, she could get snatched up.”
The recording ended with Isaac Campbell saying that he was returning to PCC to find out his final grade.
The trial continued Nov. 16 with the prosecuting team calling Anthony Grady, a mixed martial arts instructor who specialized in Aikido, Jujitsu, and Aikiro.
A postman who took up teaching Goshin-Jujitsu at Villa Park as a side job, Grady has 17 years of martial arts training under his belt.
According to Grady, Campbell had shown interest in his classes and had participated in either three or four of his classes. Then asked whether or not Grady had taught Campbell how to apply the sleeper hold, Grady replied that he didn’t remember.
According to Grady, Campbell was not a regular at his classes and he demonstrated abilities similar to those of an amateur.
“I called him a beginner because of the way he moved,” Grady said during cross-examination. “He was using more strength than leverage and there was no subtleness in his technique.”
Additional reporting by Louis Cheung
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