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PrintLYNDON, Kan. — Testimony in the trial of former Columbia Water and Light director James Kraig Kahler begins Monday, and his 12-year-old son, Sean, is expected to be the third witness to take the stand.
Sean Kahler, who was 10 at the time of the Nov. 2009, shootings, is the only living witness to the killings. He testified during Kraig Kahler’s Dec. 21 preliminary hearing that he saw his father shoot his mother and heard several more shots as he ran out of his great-grandmother’s Burlingame home.
- A handcuffed James Kraig Kahler was escorted from the Osage County Courthouse on Aug. 29 by deputies shortly after a jury decided to impose the death penalty on him.
- Stephen Peterson, forensic psychiatrist, told jurors James Kraig Kahler was psychologically out of control when he fatally shot four members of his family in November 2009 in Burlingame, Kan. Peterson was hired by the defense.
- Using his hands to symbolize scales, defense attorney Tom Haney told Osage County District Court jurors on Aug. 29 to weigh the mitigating and aggravating circumstances to decide whether to impose the death penalty on capital murderer James Kraig Kahler or put him in prison for life without parole.
- Osage County Attorney Brandon Jones numbers off the four victims as he urged jurors to impose the death penalty on capital murderer James Kraig Kahler in court on Aug. 29.
- Chief Judge Phillip Fromme and assistant attorney general Amy Hanley (right) and Osage County Attorney Brandon Jones waited for jurors to come into the courtroom to hear arguments on Aug. 29 on whether to impose the death penalty or a life sentence without parole on capital murderer James Kraig Kahler.
- James Kraig Kahler leaves the courthouse in Lyndon, Kan., after being sentenced to death Monday in the 2009 slayings of his wife, two teenage daughters and wife's grandmother.
- James Kraig Kahler, who was convicted last week of capital murder in the fatal shooting of his estranged wife, their two teenage daughters and his wife's grandmother, looks into the spectators gallery in Osage County District Court in Lyndon, Kan., during a break in his sentencing hearing Monday.
Should he find testifying in court too difficult, Sean Kahler will be allowed to answer questions via closed-circuit television during the trial in Osage County District Court in Kansas, as he did during his father’s preliminary hearing.
Kraig Kahler is charged with four counts of capital murder in the deaths of his wife, Karen Kahler, 44; two daughters, Emily, 18, and Lauren Kahler, 16; and Karen Kahler’s grandmother, Dorothy Wight, 89. He’s also charged with one count of aggravated burglary in connection with the break-in of Wight’s home that night.
Also scheduled to testify for the prosecution Monday are Karen Kahler’s brother, Bill Hetrick, and Columbia attorney Dan Pingelton, who was representing Karen Kahler in her divorce from Kraig Kahler. The divorce was in progress when she was killed.
Sunny Reese, the woman whose relationship with Karen Kahler the defense is expected to argue caused Kraig Kahler to have a mental breakdown, is scheduled to testify Wednesday. Also on the prosecution’s witness list for Wednesday are Kraig Kahler’s parents, Wayne and Patricia Kahler.
Defense co-counsel Tom Haney said during jury selection that two psychiatrists, one for the prosecution and one for defense, will also testify over the next two weeks.
The prosecution is expected to call 38 total witnesses, 11 on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday and five on Friday.
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