The formerly blonde Sandy Murphy, a Southern California native and surfer, became a more serious-looking brunette in preparation for her upcoming murder trial.

By Laura Barandes
Court TV

Picture the scene: When Sandy Murphy was placed under house arrest, she painted her tracking ankle bracelet to match the beige designer outfit she was wearing and smiled at the cameras capturing her creative license.

There are two ways to interpret this picture. Prosecutors want jurors to see Murphy as the blonde, stylish, greedy manipulator who committed murder in the pursuit of material wealth. Murphy, claim prosecutors, loved the rich lifestyle she shared with boyfriend Ted Binion, 30 years her senior, far more than she loved the man himself. In fact, they point out, Murphy was cheating on Binion with Rick Tabish, now her co-defendant in the Binion murder case.

Read key testimony from all defense witnesses

Tabish and Murphy are accused of forcing a drug mixture down Binion's throat Sept. 17, 1998 and then suffocating him in a bid to steal his silver fortune and free Murphy from her relationship with him.

However, defense attorneys wasted no time flipping Murphy's image to that of a young naive woman who was in over her head with Binion, a 55-year-old heroin addict. She cared for, cleaned and fell victim to Binion, a man who abused her physically and emotionally, said her attorney, John Momot.

Murphy, argued Momot, repeatedly called on Binion's friends and family for help, but they always did nothing. Even the state's own witnesses testified to that.

Momot began Thursday to color in the picture of Murphy he sketched in opening statements — his picture of Murphy. He called her friends, sister-in-law, father and step-mother to the stand to show his client as a woman rooted in, and committed to, family. The Murphys, jurors heard, were a family of love, togetherness and constant birthday celebrations. These sympathetic witnesses also tarnished the image of Binion, the alleged victim.

Mrs. Sandra Murphy, who shares the same name as her defendant step-daughter, was the cause of a brief stir in the courtroom Thursday. Momot stood and said, "I'd like to call Sandy Murphy to the stand," — and his client rose beside him.

For a split second, it appeared that the defendant herself was going to testify, but then she smiled and said, "just kidding."

Momot admonished her quietly, as if scolding a child. And as much as he might have been angry at her for that display of levity in front of the jury, it demonstrated her frequent lack of a mature respect for the perilous situation she faces.

Mrs. Murphy, a small dark-haired woman, testified that she constantly counseled her step-daughter to leave the relationship with Binion. "But she loved Ted," said the witness, "and that was a choice she made."

According to Mrs. Murphy, Binion's health and appearance deteriorated during the years that she knew him. At first, she said, he appeared clean-cut and well-dressed at their meetings. By 1998, however, Mrs. Murphy said Binion would not even change out of his bathrobe. His teeth were yellow, as though he had stopped brushing them, and he was always unshaven.

The defense has argued that Binion, a heroin addict for 20 years, fell victim to his old habit, not the murderous hands of Murphy and Tabish.

Through Mrs. Murphy, Momot was also able to show jurors the abuse her step-daughter allegedly suffered at the hands of the wealthy casino giant. She testified she became so angry about the beatings that in the summer of 1997, she flew straight to Las Vegas and came to the Binion estate unannounced.

"I wanted to tell him to never do it again," said Mrs. Murphy, who claims she found her step-daughter "had a black eye, a big fat lip and she was bruised." She testified that Binion did not even stand to speak with her, though he admitted to beating his young girlfriend.

"He was actually in bed the entire time," said Mrs. Murphy. "He never got up."

Sandy Murphy mouthed "I love you" to her father as he stepped down from the stand. (Court TV)

Mrs. Murphy also gave testimony that supported the defense contention that young Sandy was never accepted in the Binion family. Mrs. Murphy said that after three years of caring for Binion, with no help from his relatives, her step-daughter was immediately under attack when he died.

She described a phone call, allegedly from Binion's brother-in-law, in which the caller mistook her for her step-daughter. "Sandy, this is Nick," she claims the caller told her. "I'm gonna see that you fry, you f***ing bitch."

Although Mrs. Murphy was a strong witness for the defense, she did admit under cross-examination that her step-daughter removed silver coins from the house on Sept. 18, 1998. She was not willing to say that they were valuable silver dollars, like the ones in Binion's collections, but the damage was done. Jurors heard from the defendant's own step-mother that she took silver from the house.

Sandy Murphy's friends and her sister-in-law also testified Thursday that Murphy was devoted to the family and was always in close communication. She stayed at her parents house, they testified, not at the Peninsula hotel with Tabish, when she came to California on the Sept. 11, 1998 weekend. She was there to celebrate her nephew's birthday.

"She never missed a birthday," said Jeanine Murphy, the defendant's sister-in-law. She paused before adding softly, "except now."

Jurors will have to decide which picture of defendant Sandy Murphy they believe. Is she the loving aunt and daughter who got in over her head with an abusive drug addict, as the defense argues, or is she a manipulative and greedy bleached blonde, capable of murdering her boyfriend for money? It's a difficult call, and the twelve Las Vegas jurors, picked from a city that bets on just about everything, will not be allowed to flip a coin on this one.