The lawyer for Robert Sepe Sr., the owner of Healthy 'N Fit International, a bodybuilding-supplements business, who is accused of bludgeoning his fiancee to death last year, has set the stage for a psychiatric defense, claiming Sepe was under "extreme emotional disturbance" when the killing occurred.
Prosecutors contend that Sepe, a businessman from Cortlandt, deliberately beat Janette Carlucci's face so viciously with a baseball bat that she had to be identified through dental records.
Both sides will present their case to a jury when Sepe's murder trial begins Monday in Westchester County Court in White Plains.
If the jury believes Sepe was extremely emotionally disturbed, it can acquit him of murder and convict him of manslaughter. Both sides plan to have psychiatrists testify about Sepe's mental state at the time of Carlucci's death.
Sepe, 54, will not testify at trial, under the advice of his attorney, Bruce Bendish.
Sepe has been held without bail at the Westchester County jail in Valhalla since March 22, 2008, the day his two sons found blood on the carpet in their father's home around noon and called police.
Authorities immediately began searching for Sepe and his white Cadillac Escalade. State police found both later that day on a highway overpass in Binghamton, where a disturbed Sepe kept police at bay for five hours while holding a knife and threatening to jump from the bridge.
Meanwhile, at the home on Quaker Hill Road he shared with the 41-year-old victim - the mother of a teenage girl - police removed a metal bat and other evidence.
Sepe, who was also indicted on a misdemeanor weapon charge, could serve 25 years to life if convicted of the murder charge.
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