Cagle Ruled Guilty
In Slaying of Wife
BISBEE, Ariz. (AP) - Michael Cagle, a young Army medical specialist, has been convicted of
second-degree murder in Cochise County Superior Court for The slaying of his wife.
The jurors convicted Cagle, 20, Tuesday in the strangulation and dismemberment of his
wife, Jeannie Lynn, 20, last May 20. Judge Lloyd C. Helm set sentencing for Nov. 28.
Cagle had been accused of strangling his wife during an argument in their mobile home in
Sierra Vista. Cagle was arrested two days later after a landfill employee discovered parts
of
Mrs. Cagle's body stuffed in garbage hags. Police said they found other parts of Mrs.
Cagle's body in the mobile home when officers served Cagle with search warrant.
The conviction of second-degree murder came as a surprise lo Cagle's mother Hazel
Schumacher of Kansas City, Mo. "I thought that manslaughter was the worst they could
have
decided,'"She said "never, never" when asked if her son could kill with
malice. "He'd pick up a little dog or cat. He even took her (his wife) in when
she was
a little stray." Prosecutor Jerry Till told the jury the slaying was committed with
"malice like none of us have ever seen." Defense attorney Clarence Moyers said
Mrs. Cagle was a
"mean, vicious woman who over a period of years abused Michael Cagle.." She once
tried to put out a lit cigarette in his eye and had previously attacked him with a knife,
the attorney
said. Cagle testified he often had to subdue his wife when she became violent and was
doing so when he strangled her. Cagle said when he picked up the knife his wife had used
to
attack him, the phone began to ring. "It was an Alfred Hitchcock-type out-side world
coming in and creating a panic," Moyers said. Cagle said every time the phone rang,
he stabbed
the body. Cagle said investigators found the head of his dead wife in his home after
other body parts were found at the landfill because he had kept it for burial. David
Tiers, a court-
appointed defense attorney. said Cagle is an "emotionally immature young man."
He-said on the night of the slaying, Mrs. Cagle was getting ready to leave her husband
after months
of discord. He said she had taken all but $l0 of the couple's money and kept waking
Cagle. who had sedated himself in order to get some sleep for work the next day,