Former Iowan Christian Longo is facing the death penalty. Longo was born and lived his childhood in Iowa, but it was after his mother moved him to Michigan that he met a young woman he married. With three young children, the couple moved to Oregon, but in December 2001 Longo disappeared, and the body of his young son was found in a coastal backwater. Searchers then found the couple’s three-year-old daughter nearby, and later found the bodies of his wife Maryjane and the couple’s 2-year-old daughter. Monday a jury convicted Longo of killing his wife and youngest child. He’s claimed his wife killed the other two children and injured the toddler, and he strangled her in a fit of rage, but the jury, which apparently didn’t buy that defense, tomorrow will begin deciding whether Longo faces 30 years to life…or Oregon’s death penalty.
