Fatal Attraction: How a steamy love affair between Jodi Arias and Travis Alexander ended in his brutal murder
Killer Jodi Arias' murder conviction could possibly overturn, thanks to the latest allegations of prosecutorial misconduct against the attorney who put her behind bars. Arias has been convicted of the brutal murder of her 30-year-old ex-boyfriend Travis Alexander, a local salesman, and motivational speaker. In a murder trial that gripped the nation for years, the then 28-year-old Arias failed to convince a jury that she had committed the crime in self-defense as she claimed and was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
In a classic case of overkill, Alexander's body was found with 27 stab wounds, his throat slashed from one side to the other and a gunshot wound to the head. He had been slain in his home in Mesa, Arizona and was found days later in his bathroom, decomposing.
Arias was born in California and met Alexander at a Pre Paid Legal Services conference in Las Vegas in September 2006. She was a photographer at the time. Their relationship was sexual and tumultuous, according to his friends. However, Alexander was affiliated to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and was of Mormon faith and pre-marital sex was something that was considered wrong in his religious sentiments. He had to keep it a secret. By November, she had converted to his faith and he had baptized her.
The two dated for five months and were in a long-distance relationship and would travel from his home in Arizona to hers in California back and forth. Even after splitting up, they kept in touch and would see each other and be physically intimate.
When Alexander started seeing other people, she became enraged and stalked him and slashed his tires. Her crazy antics were so hard to bear that once Alexander is said to have told his friends, "Don’t be surprised if you find me dead one day." Sadly, he had predicted his grizzly fate. It was alleged that he had tried to tell her to get off his back and he suspected that she had hacked into his Facebook.
Her parents have said in interviews that she had a relatively normal childhood but was possibly mentally ill and bipolar. Arias had claimed that they had abused her.
The trial revealed scandalous details about their sex life. On the day of the murder, they had not just taken graphic sexual photos, had anal sex but also made a sex tape. During her trial, she testified that as soon as the baptism was over, they had gone to a bedroom and had anal sex. The camera that was found at the crime scene also had time-stamped photos of him in the shower before and some possibly after he died. It showed grainy images of someone bleeding profusely on the floor.
With her DNA found in a bloody palm print in the bathroom and a hair sample that matched Arias, the investigators zeroed in on her as the killer. The camera appeared to have been put in the wash cycle in the laundry room.
After the murder, she is said to have visited her ex Ryan Burns in West Jordan, Utah. Alexander had been shot with a .25-caliber automatic Colt pistol - one similar to that stolen from Arias' grandparent's house during a burglary a month prior to the murder. It was never recovered. Alexander's body was found after he missed an important business call on June 4. Worried, his friends, who hadn't heard from him in days went to his home to check on him on June 9. They found pools of blood in the hallway to the master bedroom after they got inside using a key.