OLATHE, Kansas — For the first time in his four-week capital murder trial, John E. Robinson Sr. cried Thursday as his tearful wife testified about his 8-year-old granddaughter's visit with him at the Johnson County Jail.

After Robinson's arrest in June 2000, Nancy Robinson said, the little girl was having some emotional difficulties and wanted very badly to see the grandfather who had taken care of her several times a week.

"They have a bond that is unbelievable," she said. "She is the apple of his eye."

Nancy Robinson said that she and her daughter, Christy Shipps, waited in the lobby of the jail while a guard escorted the little girl to meet the defendant. Later, Nancy Robinson said, her granddaughter told her that she had thrown her arms around her grandfather and, in a reference to his prison garb, exclaimed: "Papa, orange is not your color!"

Upon hearing that testimony, the defendant's shoulders shook and he took off his glasses and began wiping his eyes with a handkerchief.

Nancy Robinson was the first witness called by the defense in an attempt to save her husband's life. The same jury that convicted him of capital and first-degree murder Tuesday will soon decide whether to sentence him to death by lethal injection or life in prison without the possibility of parole.

Before beginning opening statements in the penalty phase, defense attorney Sean O'Brien asked for a delay in sentencing, saying his team had not had enough time to conduct a thorough mental health evaluation of their client.

In September, shortly before trial, the defense had filed a motion to send Robinson to the University of Kansas Medical Center for medical testing, saying they had stumbled upon indications of mental disease, including disassociation and depression. They also said he has a history of severe physical and emotional abuse throughout childhood.

Judge John Anderson III remained unconvinced by their request, however, saying that the attorneys had been on the case for more than a year and had been given adequate time to prepare for both the guilt and penalty phase.

Prosecutor Paul Morrison asked jurors to impose the death penalty based on the fact that Robinson had murdered more than one person. He said he would not present new testimony, but rely on the evidence already submitted.

"No mitigating circumstances can ever come close to matching the weight of the aggravating circumstances," Morrison said. "The enormity of the defendant's offenses if overwhelming. At the close [of this phase], your path will be very, very clear."

But defense attorney Patrick Berrigan pleaded with the jury to save the defendant's life. "You have already decreed that he's not going to walk amongst you anymore," he said. "You have determined that he will spend the rest of his days in a penal institution."

Robinson, Berrigan said, had raised an exceptional family and loved his wife, four children and seven grandchildren very much. "If it can be said that the family is the inner sanctum of the soul, there's more to John Robinson than the horrible story you've heard so far," he said.

Berrigan told them that they should hear more about his background and his mental state but that that would not be possible. "You're not going to hear how these two people — a killer of women and a man who loves his family — could live in the same body," he said.

What they would hear, he said, is how this man would not pose a threat to anyone in prison should that be his sentence. "I'm going to ask you to do a hard thing: to spare this man's life," Berrigan said. "You can meet justice with compassion. You don't have to kill John Robinson to incapacitate him. I'm going to ask you to remember that one man or woman with courage makes a difference."

In order to impose the death penalty, all 12 jurors must agree that aggravating factors in the case outweigh mitigating factors.

Robinson's wife told the court that her entire family is having a very hard time dealing with the possibility of his execution. "It's devastating, absolutely devastating," she said, also dabbing her eyes with Kleenex. "He's their dad, he's their grandfather. They love him."

On cross-examination, however, Morrison sought to poke holes in her portrayal of Robinson as a loving and devoted family man.

Calling Robinson the "infidel deluxe," Morrison questioned how she could stand by him despite his numerous affairs. "In fact, you're still married to him today," he said. "Is murder enough to break the marital bond for you?"

"I don't know," she stumbled. "Not right now."

In earlier testimony, Nancy Robinson had suggested that she's stayed with her husband because of her children and grandchildren.

Morrison also asked her why she didn't tell the police that her husband had brought home a disheveled baby when they were investigating the disappearance of Lisa Stasi and her baby in 1985. "I was not asked," she replied. "If you don't know what they're looking for, you can't volunteer anything."

Robinson has been convicted in the first-degree murder of Stasi and of arranging the illegal adoption of her baby to his brother and sister-in-law, Don and Helen Robinson. He has also been convicted in the capital murders of Suzette Trouten, 27, of Michigan, and Izabela Lewicka, 21, of Indiana, whose bodies were found stuffed in barrels on his rural Kansas property.

"Would it affect your opinion if you knew that your husband had taken [his granddaughter] along on [sex and bondage] liaisons?" Morrison asked. "Would that change your opinion?

"Mr. Morrison!" said Nancy Robinson, visibly agitated, as the defense objected.

But Morrison told the court he had evidence that Robinson had indeed brought his granddaughter along on sadomasochistic sex encounters and he was ready to present the evidence if necessary.

"I know this is stressful for you but it is not, however, an argument," Judge John Anderson III told the witness, instructing her to answer the question.

"I don't know," she then replied.

Morrison also presented Nancy Robinson with a note she had written to her husband, asking him about e-mail messages from other women and why he hadn't found a job. "You can only push a person so far and rub [my] face in shit so much," she said, reading from her note.

"That's hardly a description of a good family man, is it?" Morrison asked.

"It's not a description of a great husband, okay?" replied the witness, clearly upset.

But Morrison persisted. "Do you believe your husband killed all of these women?"

"If that's what the jury said, yes," said Robinson's flustered wife.

With that, Morrison wrapped up his cross-examination.

In other testimony, jurors heard a former prison warden and a forensic psychologist say Robinson was not likely to pose a threat to anyone should he be sentenced to life in prison. They cited his age — 58 — and the fact that he had been a model prisoner while serving five years in Kansas and Missouri correctional facilities and the last two years in the Johnson County Jail.

In cross-examination, assistant district attorney Sara Welch got the forensic psychologist, who had studied Robinson's prison records, to admit that his wife, Nancy, and daughter, Christy, were the only two family members who visited him with any regularity. His other three children, he said, had not been to the jail at all.

A former correspondent for Newsweek and People Weekly, Sue Miller Wiltz is currently writing a book about Robinson for Pinnacle Books. She is covering the trial for Courttv.com.