The Contract Murder of Kathryn Ann Martini-Lissy

Another witness, a certified nursing assistant, testified that he and Lissy had previously been involved in other fraud schemes and murder plots, in some of which he had helped Lissy. He testified that he had helped Lissy transfer merchandise and money between convenience stores that Lissy and his ex-wife had managed. He also had helped Lissy carry out an $11,000 home-burglary insurance-claim fraud scheme in which he and Lissy had moved several truckloads of furniture and household appliances from his and his ex-wife's home to a rental storage unit. The witness said that he had been paid for his services with a 19-inch color television.

The nursing assistant also testified that he and Lissy had discussed plans to kill Lissy's elderly aunt for an inheritance and that Lissy had "seemed detached, like it was someone else talking," during the discussions. They had also discussed plans to get Lissy's ex-wife drunk and knock her off of Lissy's sailboat to claim her life insurance benefit. They also had talked about a plan in which Kathryn would be given a drug overdose or arrange a fatal car accident for her in order to obtain her life insurance benefit. The witness testified that he was to be paid with a sailboat for helping to kill Lissy's ex-wife, nd for helping with Kathy's murder, he said, he would have been paid "approximately fifty-percent of the insurance money."

"I think Kathryn had somewhere up in the quarter-million dollar figure [in life insurance]," the nursing assistant told the jury. "He said if she were out of town on business, the insurance would pay off better."

However, the witness said that he had never actually helped Lissy carry out any of his death plots, and therefore had not been paid anything.