Crime File: When chaos breaks out in the courtroom
THE TERRIFYING MOMENTS TRIALS DESCENDED INTO ANARCHY, DISORDER AND DEATH
GUNNED DOWN
When the prosecution asked David Paradiso why he had fatally stabbed his 20-year-old girlfriend in the neck at his trial in California in 2006, he replied that “she deserved to die”. His shocking response elicited loud gasps from his family in the courtroom, who protested that Paradiso was not mentally fit to testify, and prompted Superior Court Judge Cinda Fox to order a recess to defuse the situation.
As the jury filed out of the court, Paradiso suddenly jumped out of the witness box, walked to the judge’s bench and pushed Judge Fox down. The 28 year old then punched her, before pulling out an improvised six inch-long metal blade and repeatedly stabbing her in the arm. Detective Eric Bradley, the lead investigator in the murder case, approached the bench and shot Paradiso in the head three times, killing him instantly. It later emerged that Paradiso, who had already spent two years in prison on remand for the killing, had hidden a second homemade knife in one of the courthouse’s holding cells. Post-mortem blood tests revealed traces of methamphetamine in his system. It was also revealed that, two weeks before Paradiso’s death, his mother had anonymously called the Sheriff’s Office to warn them that she believed her son had a weapon. Debra Paradiso later told reporters she was convinced he had attacked the judge because he was mentally ill and wanted to provoke officers into shooting him. “I’m sure that’s what he wanted,” she said.