Gunman's in-law testifies at Cloud trial

The capital murder trial of the woman accused of hiring a hitman to kill her husband continued Wednesday with the defense asking to have a witness' testimony stricken from the court record.

Attorney Mike Donovan, who represents Lois Kay Cloud, told the court that the Betty Howerton has answered questions asked of her during her testimony with responses of "I don't remember" or "I don't recall" a total of 141 times so far.

Donovan said he characterized those types of responses as Howerton trying to avoid answering questions posed of her by the defense.

"In reality, here is a witness I don't have the opportunity to exam," Donovan said. "It appears she has a virus when it comes to answering defense questions."

He also said Howerton has been given immunity from prosecution in a plea agreement in exchange for her testimony and that her seeming unwillingness to answer questions violated his client's Sixth Amendment right to confront witnesses.

Prosecutor Levi Gunderson responded by saying, "We have a 77-year-old woman testifying to events that happened 12 years or so ago."

Superior Court Judge Larry Kenworthy, who is presiding over the trial eventually ruled against Donovan's motion.

Lois Kay Cloud is facing charges of first-degree murder, solicitation to commit first-degree murder and hindering prosecution. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty.

She is accused of hiring Vincent Lee Accardo to kill her husband, Bard farmer Kenneth Cloud, who was 55 when he was shot to death in the parking lot of Burgers and Beer, 321 W. 20th St., on Dec. 9, 1997.

Accardo was sentenced by a jury in June 2008 to die by lethal injection after being found guilty of first-degree murder. He was also given a statutory life sentence on a conspiracy charge associated with the slaying.

Howerton is the mother of Lisa Baker, who was also a co-defendant in the case and eventually became Accardo's wife. She was sentenced in March 2004 in Yuma County Superior Court for hindering prosecution.

During its cross examination of Howerton, Donovan questioned her about statements she had made during interviews with police and her testimony at a previous trial.

Donovan started off by asking Howerton, who was testifying for the prosecution, about the night of the murder and why her answers during this trial were different than answers she has given before, specifically as to whether she actually saw Accardo shoot anyone and how many shots she heard.

Howerton was riding in the car with her daughter when she drove Accardo to Burger's and Beer shortly before Cloud was murdered.

They had picked up Accardo in her maroon Chevrolet Lumina from the Travel Lodge Motel and after driving around, finally went and parked in the restaurant's parking lot.

Howerton had previously stated in the interviews that she had seen Accardo standing outside of the pickup talking to someone and the shooting had occurred outside the pickup. She also stated that she had seen a flash and heard gunshots as they were driving away from the parking lot in her daughter's maroon Chevrolet Lumina.

As he continued with the cross-examination, Donovan questioned Howerton about Accardo's finances.

Since Accardo had no job or visible source of income, and owed substantial money to medical bills, Donovan wanted to know how he was able to try and buy four parcels of property valued at a million dollars in 1998 and $650,000 of land in Nevada in May 2000.

He also tried to call into question whether Howerton was afraid of Accardo as she had testified by asking her about why she attended their wedding and why she continued taking trips with them in the years after the murder.

"You weren't afraid of the man," Donovan said. "In fact you wanted your daughter to share in his criminal wealth."

During her testimony Wednesday, Howerton said Accardo had a Cadillac titled in her other daughter's name. A Cadillac is one of the many gifts Cloud was reported to have given Accardo.

As she continued with her testimony, Howard said when she came to Yuma in the latter part of 1997, Accardo and Baker were driving her son's brand-new Chevrolet pickup truck.

Howerton's son, Jon, had previously testified that he had loaned the pickup to Accardo as part of an insurance scam.

She also testified that shortly before the murder, she and her daughter took a shuttle to Phoenix, where Accardo met them the following day.

While there, Howerton said, they picked up the Chevy Lumina from the parking lot of a restaurant along Black Canyon Freeway and drove back to McAllen, Texas.

While in McAllen, the week before they returned to Yuma in December 1997, Howerton said, Accardo received a phone call from Cloud while at her home one day.

Donovan sought to depict Howerton through his cross-examination as willing to say anything to keep her daughter from facing a similar fate as his client.

"When (Baker) needed a plea agreement to dismiss murder charges  you created a script and story to help her out," Donovan said.

Under redirect from the prosecution, Howerton said she kept quiet about the murder to protect her daughter.

"It is embedded in my mind forever," Howerton said of the murder. "I saw Accardo holding a gun in both hands pointing it at the pickup."