ultraman69er
11-30-2012, 06:34 AM
By Alison Langley, Niagara Falls Review
Thursday, November 29, 2012 8:55:18 EST AM
The families of Cassey Cichocki and Diane Dimitri gasped then broke into applause after a jury foreperson stood in court and announced Michael Durant was guilty of two counts of first-degree murder.
The six-man, six-woman jury deliberated for almost 65 hours over seven days before reaching a verdict Wednesday afternoon.
Durant, dressed in a wrinkled green dress shirt and black dress pants, showed no emotion as the verdict was read.
Justice James Ramsay sentenced the 39-year-old Niagara Falls man to life in prison with no possibility of parole for 25 years.
Outside the court house, friends and families of the murdered women rejoiced.
“Guilty! Guilty!” one man yelled as he ran up and down the sidewalk in front of Welland Superior Court.
Wilma Kyle, Cichocki’s stepmother, was overcome with emotion.
“The past seven days have been torture,” she said. “We have been on pins and needles. We were just praying.”
She said she was grateful the jury looked beyond the fact that the murdered women were involved in the sex trade to fuel a drug addiction.
“They looked at these girls as human beings. They looked at them as our daughters.”
Kyriacos Kyriacou, Dimitri’s step-father added: “This has been a long time coming. This has been a roller-coaster ride.”
While nothing can bring back his stepdaughter, Kyriacou said the convictions can assist his family as they continue to heal.
“There is no closure,” he said. “There will never be closure. But at least this is something that proves our system is working. We’re taking a bad human being off the streets so he will not do it again to anybody else.”
Kyriacou, who is raising Dimitri’s children, said he has been shielding them from media reports on the trial.
“I’ve been really keeping them away from the core of all this,” he said. “They do know what’s going on and I’m sure they will be very happy when I go home and tell them what happened.”
Dimitri was 32 years old in 2003 when she went to a party at Durant’s Toby Cr., home in Niagara Falls.
During the trial, jurors heard she was hit in the head with a hammer. The murder weapon has never been found.
Dana Arnold, who was married to Durant at the time, said she came home to find a badly injured Dimitri in their home. She testified Durant made her drive to a rural area near the boundary of Welland and Niagara Falls. That’s where her body was dumped.
Durant’s lawyer Michael Lacy maintained Arnold was a skilled liar who made up the story and that Dimitri’s killer is her former boyfriend, a drug addict who later died of a drug overdose.
Cichocki’s body was discovered in an isolated area in the north end of Niagara Falls in 2006. She was 22.
Crown attorney David King contends Durant incapacitated Cichocki in his Queen St. apartment, took her into the basement and beat her to death. The young woman suffered more than a dozen blows to the head.
Four drops of blood were found on the underside of a staircase leading to the basement.
The Crown maintains Durant cleaned the area with acid then applied a fresh coat of paint to the floors, top of the stairs and parts of the walls.
Durant has been in custody since he was arrested in 2006.
Thursday, November 29, 2012 8:55:18 EST AM
The families of Cassey Cichocki and Diane Dimitri gasped then broke into applause after a jury foreperson stood in court and announced Michael Durant was guilty of two counts of first-degree murder.
The six-man, six-woman jury deliberated for almost 65 hours over seven days before reaching a verdict Wednesday afternoon.
Durant, dressed in a wrinkled green dress shirt and black dress pants, showed no emotion as the verdict was read.
Justice James Ramsay sentenced the 39-year-old Niagara Falls man to life in prison with no possibility of parole for 25 years.
Outside the court house, friends and families of the murdered women rejoiced.
“Guilty! Guilty!” one man yelled as he ran up and down the sidewalk in front of Welland Superior Court.
Wilma Kyle, Cichocki’s stepmother, was overcome with emotion.
“The past seven days have been torture,” she said. “We have been on pins and needles. We were just praying.”
She said she was grateful the jury looked beyond the fact that the murdered women were involved in the sex trade to fuel a drug addiction.
“They looked at these girls as human beings. They looked at them as our daughters.”
Kyriacos Kyriacou, Dimitri’s step-father added: “This has been a long time coming. This has been a roller-coaster ride.”
While nothing can bring back his stepdaughter, Kyriacou said the convictions can assist his family as they continue to heal.
“There is no closure,” he said. “There will never be closure. But at least this is something that proves our system is working. We’re taking a bad human being off the streets so he will not do it again to anybody else.”
Kyriacou, who is raising Dimitri’s children, said he has been shielding them from media reports on the trial.
“I’ve been really keeping them away from the core of all this,” he said. “They do know what’s going on and I’m sure they will be very happy when I go home and tell them what happened.”
Dimitri was 32 years old in 2003 when she went to a party at Durant’s Toby Cr., home in Niagara Falls.
During the trial, jurors heard she was hit in the head with a hammer. The murder weapon has never been found.
Dana Arnold, who was married to Durant at the time, said she came home to find a badly injured Dimitri in their home. She testified Durant made her drive to a rural area near the boundary of Welland and Niagara Falls. That’s where her body was dumped.
Durant’s lawyer Michael Lacy maintained Arnold was a skilled liar who made up the story and that Dimitri’s killer is her former boyfriend, a drug addict who later died of a drug overdose.
Cichocki’s body was discovered in an isolated area in the north end of Niagara Falls in 2006. She was 22.
Crown attorney David King contends Durant incapacitated Cichocki in his Queen St. apartment, took her into the basement and beat her to death. The young woman suffered more than a dozen blows to the head.
Four drops of blood were found on the underside of a staircase leading to the basement.
The Crown maintains Durant cleaned the area with acid then applied a fresh coat of paint to the floors, top of the stairs and parts of the walls.
Durant has been in custody since he was arrested in 2006.