ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, July 12, 1996 TAG: 9607120043
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LAURENCE HAMMACK STAFF WRITER
JOYCE MOHADESS, saying she feared a beating, or even worse, at the hands of her boyfriend the night he died, pleaded guilty to manslaughter Thursday.
When the local television news came on the night of May 16, Joyce Mohadess paid particular attention to a story about Roanoke's first murder case of the year.
She had no idea that, minutes later, she would become involved in the second.
The news account, about a man accused of killing his sister's abusive boyfriend, struck a chord with Mohadess. She was engaged to be married the following month to a man who had frequently beaten her during their stormy relationship, she would later tell police.
As Mohadess, 42, sat in a Patterson Avenue Southwest apartment that night, talking to her next-door neighbor about the story, her fiance walked in. Thomas Earl Spivey had been drinking, and Mohadess feared that she was in for another beating - or worse.
Spivey grabbed Mohadess and told her to come along. He said: "I'll take you where you need to be, at Hamlar-Curtis" funeral home, Mohadess told Detective M.S. Rubeiz of the Roanoke Police Department.
In their own apartment across the hall, Mohadess was at first resigned to take whatever came next.
"I thought it would calm him down if I didn't fight him back," she told Rubeiz.
"But in my mind I said `No, I've done seen it on TV too many times. ... I cannot let this man hurt me.' ... I thought about when he had hit me before and I didn't hit him back, and I thought about on the news. ... I'm not going to take it."
Mohadess pulled out a white-handled steak knife that, she said, "I had saved for this time. I had saved it because I've gotten enough a-- beating from him."
And then, she told Rubeiz simply: "I stabbed him."
A copy of the statement was introduced as evidence Thursday in Roanoke Circuit Court, after Mohadess pleaded guilty to a charge of voluntary manslaughter. As part of a plea agreement, she was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Assistant Commonwealth's Attorney Tom Bowers said the previous allegations of domestic abuse were one reason prosecutors agreed to reduce Mohadess' murder charge to manslaughter. Spivey, who had a long criminal record that included charges of drug dealing and malicious wounding, had a blood-alcohol content of more than twice the legal limit at the time of his death.
But Mohadess - who has been convicted of theft, prostitution, and drug charges - may not have fared well in a trial. Her neighbor told police that Mohadess had complained about Spivey owing her money, and said she was going to "f--- him up."
Assistant Public Defender Gretchen Knoblauch said she thought 10 years was too long a sentence for Mohadess, but said her client accepted the plea agreement because she did not want to risk a longer term from a jury.
Mohadess will be eligible for release after she serves about eight years.
In a summary of the evidence, Bowers said police were called to an apartment in the 1900 block of Patterson Avenue Southwest the night of May 16. They found Spivey, 40, lying face down in a hallway between the two apartments. He was taken to Carilion Roanoke Memorial Hospital, where he died several hours later from a stab wound to the chest.
Before learning that Spivey was dead, Mohadess told police that he had fallen on a nail.
But as she was being driven to the police station, Mohadess blurted out an unsolicited confession. "I love him," she told the police officer driving the car. "I don't want him to be hurt. But I did stab him."
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