The Vicious End of the Steinberg Marriage
In 1981, the marriage of Steven Steinberg of Scottsdale, Arizona, and his wife Elena, came to a violent end. She met her end by his knife He initially tried to blame it on burglars and a home invasion gone wrong. When police investigators debunked that possibility, he confessed that he killed her. However, he claimed to have done it while sleepwalking, a condition caused by excessive stress from his wife’s constant nagging for money. In the trial that followed in the Maricopa County Courthouse, the prosecutors put all their eggs in one basket and made a case for premeditated murder.
In hindsight, the prosecutors’ failure to hedge their bets and add some more charges as alternates turned out to be a mistake. Steinberg’s attorney, who specialized in insanity defenses, made a case for not guilty by reason of insanity. The defense was helped by evidence of sloppiness and incompetence on the part of the Scottsdale police in their investigation. Steven himself testified that he was unaware of the homicide at the time, that he was asleep when it took place, and so it must have happened while he was sleepwalking.