Although Clara Darlene Mathews testified that her husband had beaten and raped her, a Baltimore County jury yesterday took less than an hour to convict her of a plot to hire an undercover state trooper to kill him at their Ruxton home last summer.
Mathews, 51, was found guilty of conspiracy to commit murder and three counts of solicitation to murder, each carrying a maximum possible sentence of life in prison.
Prosecutors dropped a count of attempted murder halfway through the trial, which prevented the jury from considering Mathews' "battered spouse" defense. That prompted her attorney to ask for a mistrial, but the motion was denied.
According to testimony, Mathews paid a friend of her son to find someone to kill her husband, Henry Burke Mathews, 69. But the youth went to the county police, who enlisted the aid of State Police Tfc. George Forsythe. Trooper Forsythe posed as the killer and wore a wire to record the agreement and a payment.
Trooper Forsythe told the jury he was to kill Mr. Mathews -- and his son, William Mathews, if he were present -- and return with Mr. Mathews' wallet as proof.
Mr. Mathews testified that he and his wife led separate lives soon after their marriage in 1988 -- but he vehemently denied abusing her.
He told the jury that he went to bed Aug. 10 in their house on Ruxton Ridge Garth after his wife had gone out on a supposed emergency.
At about 11 p.m., he said, he was awakened by several police officers at his door.
"They sat down and proceeded to tell me my wife had made an attempt to have me killed. My first reaction was this was the most elaborate practical joke anybody had ever played on me," he recalled. Then, "I realized this was for real."
Mr. Mathews said he "sat in the kitchen, trying to imagine all this stuff was really happening," while the undercover trooper took proof of the purported killing to Clara Mathews, received a payment and arrested her.
The defendant's attorney, Richard Karceski, did not contest the events but outlined a "battered spouse" defense that allows a jury to consider alleged abuse in murder or attempted murder cases.
Mathews admitted trying to have her husband killed but denied any attempt against his son. She began to cry almost as soon as she took the stand, telling the jury of sexual abuse by her father that forced her to live on her own at age 16.
She said she met the recently widowed Mr. Mathews in 1988, soon after she moved into his Ruxton neighborhood, and they married within the year. She said he began to abuse her and raped her many times beginning in 1989.
"I was just badgered all the time," she said, sobbing. "He would say, 'You're a good little girl' and be very nice to me, but when I would challenge him . . . then he was very mean to me."
But in midtrial, prosecutors Kim Detrick and Stephen Roscher dropped the charge of attempted first-degree murder. That left the solicitation and conspiracy charges, which are not subject to the battered spouse defense.
Mr. Mathews, who has filed a multimillion-dollar civil lawsuit against his wife, expressed mixed emotions after the trial.
"I do categorically deny all her charges," he said. "She's my wife, and I can't be pleased that this has happened to my wife, but I believe the correct verdict was rendered."
Circuit Judge James T. Smith Jr. scheduled sentencing Feb. 28.