The woman on trial for her husband’s murder said she shot him out of self-defense, her father testified Thursday.
John Cihak reluctantly took the stand in the trial of his daughter Julie Harper, 41, accused of first-degree murder in the death of her husband, beloved Carlsbad High School teacher Jason Harper. He was shot to death inside the couple’s Carlsbad home on Aug. 7, 2012, just days after his wife asked him for a divorce.
Prosecutors made it clear in court that Cihak was not willing to testify against his daughter, but the District Attorney’s Office sent him a subpoena to require it.
Cihak told the jury his daughter unexpectedly showed up alone at his Normal Heights real estate office on Aug. 7, 2012.
She walked in and told him “Jason was dead,” he said.
Cihak asked her to repeat it.
“‘Jason is dead,’” recounted Cihak, “and I’m… I sort of went into shock. I started saying something like, ‘What, when, how. Just got into a lot of trauma in my mind.”
But when the prosecutor asked him what Harper’s answers were, he said he did not recall.
The only thing he said he could remember of their conversation was, “she said something, uh, ‘I shot Jason to defend myself.’”
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Cihak told the court his first reaction was shock, and his second thought was to seek out a defense attorney.
The deputy district attorney asked it if occurred to him to call 911, and he said he did not think of that. Nor did he ask about the gun Harper used or about why she needed to defend herself, Cihak testified.
Under prosecution questioning, he did say he did not see anything on Harper that would indicate she had been in a physical struggle.
Cihak and Harper set up a meeting with defense attorney Paul Pfingst, who advised them not to talk with police about the case, the suspect’s father said.
That night, the two picked up Harper’s three children and took them to Cihak’s Scripps Ranch home. Again, Cihak told the court he and Harper did not discuss what happened between her and Jason before they went to sleep.
At 5:30 the next morning, they were awoken by Carlsbad Police officers ringing the doorbell, but Cihak said they did not answer because of Pfingst’s advice.
Harper turned herself over to police later that day at her father’s home while Cihak took his grandchildren to Rady Children’s Hospital for a police-mandated evaluation.
That same day – Aug. 8, 2012 – police searched Cihak’s house and seized his computer, his personal guns and some money.
What they missed, proseuctors pointed out, was a bag that Cihak said he had kept in his car because he thought it belonged to one of his grandchildren.
Instead, the bag held a gun, the family’s passports, $39,000 in cash, jewelry and prescription pill bottles holding at least 300 pills, which Cihak did not discover until days later, he said.
"Did you wonder to yourself why there is a bag with a gun, passports, jewelry and $39,000 cash?” the deputy DA asked Cihak.
"It looked like a lot of stuff that she would accumulate when she was leaving her house,” said Cihak. He claimed the family was planning to go on an Alaskan cruise before Jason was found dead.
Julie instructed her attorney to use the cash to pay for her bail, which is why Cihak finally looked inside, he testified.
After Pfingst and a coworker arranged a meeting to hand over the money, they watched Cihak place the bag in his attic, he said.
The prosecution asked Cihak if he believed he was hiding items of evidence from the police, to which he responded, “No.”
Police executed another search warrant days later and seized the bag as evidence.
Harper's jury trial continues Friday. If convicted, she faces up to 50 years to life in prison.
