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Defense Requests Life In Prison For Convicted Killer

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By THOMAS W. KRAUSE, The Tampa Tribune

Published: November 2, 2007

TAMPA - A day after a jury convicted Khalid Ali Pasha of killing his wife and her adult daughter, his attorney described him as likable, hard-working, religious and generous.

"He had one fatal flaw: He was a womanizer," Robert Fraser told a jury this morning. "Fidelity was not in his makeup."

In Thursday's hearing, Fraser attempted to persuade the jury to send Pasha to prison for the rest of his life with no possibility of parole. Should a majority of the jurors agree with prosecutors when they reconvene today, Pasha could be sentenced to death by lethal injection.

Fraser said Pasha left his first wife for another woman then served a stint in prison for robbery. In 2002, after serving a prison term for another robbery, he left his second wife for Robin Canady.

On Wednesday, he was convicted of stabbing to death Canady and Ranesha Singleton, her 20-year-old daughter.

Fraser said he could offer the jury no motive for the deaths of Canady and Singleton.

Pasha, he said, can be paranoid, deeply suspicious and not trusting.

"How that plays in with these murders, frankly, is not as clear as I'd like it to be, but it might be a hint at a reason," Fraser said.

Pasha sat in the courtroom today in an orange jail jumpsuit. Through the past several days of trial testimony, Pasha wore a dark suit and tie.

"As you can tell from Mr. Pasha's garb today," Fraser told the jurors, "he is no longer fit to live among us."

Life in prison, Fraser said, is the appropriate punishment. No matter what the jury does, Pasha will wear similar inmate clothing until he is dead.

Prosecutors kept the arguments simple and to the point Thursday.
Assistant State Attorney Jalal Harb told the jurors that Pasha's past crimes as well as the facts of the murders as described in trial testimony provided enough aggravating factors to outweigh any mitigating factors presented by the defense.

At trial, witnesses testified that on Aug. 23, 2002, they were in the parking lot behind Woodland Corporate Center near Waters and North Manhattan avenues. They saw Pasha walk in and out of the woods carrying a shiny object while wearing a white jumpsuit covered with blood. They followed Pasha in their pickup truck until authorities arrived to arrest him.

Through the woods, investigators found a cul-de-sac and Canady's car, filled with blood.

Assistant Medical Examiner Sam Gulino testified Thursday that both victims were stabbed and struck with blunt force, starting while they were sitting in the car.

Both women exited the car and collapsed on the cul-de-sac pavement. From there, the lifeless bodies were dragged several feet to the spots where officers found them.

Gulino said both victims also had "defensive wounds" that were made on the arms and hands as they tried to fight off the attack.

Reporter Thomas W. Krause can be reached at (813)259-7698 or tkrause@tampatrib.com.

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