07/19/2006

Unger gets life in prison

He professes innocence in slaying of his wife at Lower Herring Lake

By JOHN FLESHER

Associated Press Writer

The Associated Press
Mark Unger addresses the court during his sentencing Tuesday in Manistee.

MANISTEE — Claiming innocence to the end, Mark Unger was sentenced Tuesday to life in prison without parole for killing his estranged wife during a family outing at a northern Michigan resort nearly three years ago.

"Despite the ridiculous verdict in this case, my children know in their hearts that I loved Flo, that I love them and that I would never do anything to harm them or their mother," said Unger, 46, a suburban Detroit resident convicted of first-degree murder last month in the death of 37-year-old Florence Unger.

But the victim's father, Harold Stern, denounced Mark Unger as a self-obsessed, immoral man and voiced regret that society would have "the burden of housing, clothing and feeding his worthless carcass."

"For his despicable crime, he deserves to rot in prison for the rest of his life in this world and ... in eternal hell in the next," Stern said, standing inches from the seated defendant and choking with emotion as his wife, Claire, wept nearby.

The trial was held in Benzie County Circuit Court in Beulah but the sentencing hearing was moved to the courthouse in neighboring Manistee County because of a storm-related power outage.

Benzie County Circuit Judge James Batzer ordered a life term, mandatory under Michigan law for first-degree murder, after denying Unger's motions to throw out the verdict or grant a new trial. Defense attorney Robert Harrison pledged to appeal, acknowledging in an interview that murder convictions are seldom overturned.

"But this is not a typical case," he said. "This is a unique case, which means the normal odds don't apply."

Chief prosecutor Donna Pendergast, an assistant state attorney general, said she was confident the verdict would stand. "It was a clean trial," she said.

Florence Unger had filed for divorce when joining her husband and sons Max, now 12, and Tyler, 10, on a weekend getaway to the Watervale, a lakeside resort in southwestern Benzie County. Friends testified she had become disillusioned with Mark Unger, who underwent therapy for drug and alcohol addiction and ran up gambling debts, forcing her to return to work while he stayed home.

Florence Unger's body was found floating at the shallow edge of Lower Herring Lake the morning of Oct. 25, 2003. She had fallen from a boathouse rooftop deck to a concrete apron 12 feet below and ended up in the water several feet away.

Mark Unger told police the couple had walked onto the deck the previous night and he returned to their rented cottage to check on the children. When he returned, his wife was gone. Assuming she was visiting one of the resort's owners in a nearby house, he went to bed and realized the next morning she had never returned.

During the nine-week trial, prosecutors wove together circumstantial evidence they said told a different story: The couple apparently began quarreling on the deck, and Florence Unger was forced over a wooden railing. As she lay unconscious from a possibly mortal head injury, her husband dragged her into the water to finish her off and stage an accident.

Defense attorneys, accusing police of rushing to judgment, countered with specialists who said Florence Unger could have fallen accidentally and described the deck railing as rotted and dangerously low.

Harrison told Batzer the conviction was "the grossest of miscarriages of justice that I think I have ever seen in my life."

Unger, his tone subdued, said had taken a lie detector test, cooperated with authorities and presented "ample evidence of my innocence."

"I am hopeful that one day I will be able to hold my children in my arms," he said. "I will continue to fight for them because they do want their father back. They know it, I know it and, most of all, Flo knows it."

Harold Stern, describing his daughter as a loyal friend and loving mother, scornfully dismissed doubts about Unger's guilt.

He labeled his former son-in-law a psychopath who schemed to win custody of the couple's children, keep their house and loaf through life supported by insurance "blood money" and disability benefits.

"This would put him in the same class as his model, O.J. Simpson, so that he could play golf all day and pursue his addictions at night," Stern said.

Mark Unger shook his head and Claire Stern nodded as the judge noted that not only had the defendant killed a wife and daughter, he'd taken away his sons' mother — "and by his actions, he's deprived his own children of their father."

Even the harshest sentence won't make up for that, Batzer said. "It's like Humpty Dumpty. No one can put anything together again."

MANISTEE — Mark Unger professed his innocence Tuesday before being sentenced to life in prison without parole in the death of his estranged wife at a northern Michigan resort in 2003.

"I was wrongfully convicted of this crime. I am innocent," Unger, 45, of Huntington Woods, said before the sentence was handed down. "I know and have confidence that our appeal will overturn this wrongful conviction."

But Harold Stern, Florence Unger's father, complained to the court that society would be burdened with caring for Mark Unger's "worthless carcass."

"He deserves to rot in prison for the rest of this life in this world and ... in eternal hell in the next," Stern said.

A jury on June 21 convicted Unger of first-degree murder. Benzie County Circuit Judge James Batzer sentenced Unger to the mandatory term in Manistee County Circuit Court, where the hearing was moved because of a power outage in Beulah.

Thunderstorms that began late Monday dumped as much as 2 inches of rain on parts of the state's Lower Peninsula and knocked out electrical service to at least 290,000 utility customers, officials say.

Prosecutors say Unger pushed Florence Unger, 37, from a boathouse rooftop deck the night of Oct. 24, 2003. She fell 12 feet to a concrete apron and her body was found the next morning at the shallow edge of Lower Herring Lake.

A lawyer for Mark Unger promised to appeal.