Dally Calls Radio Station, Insists He Is Not Guilty

A day after prosecutors agreed not to push for his execution, convicted killer Michael Dally called a radio station Tuesday to talk about his trial and the life prison sentence he now faces for the murder of his wife, Sherri.

“Nobody is prepared to spend the rest of their life behind bars,” he said during a 30-minute interview. “You just have to deal with it one day at a time.”

Dally, 37, could have been sentenced to death if prosecutors had elected to retry the penalty phase of his trial, which ended in a hung jury last month.

But wanting to spare friends and family members the agony of a second court proceeding, prosecutors decided not to pursue a retrial and settled instead for a sentence of life in prison.

Dally automatically faces that punishment after the jury found him guilty April 6 of first-degree murder, kidnapping and conspiracy, as well as two special-circumstance allegations. A sentencing hearing is set for June 9.

For his part, Dally said it makes little difference whether he received the death penalty or life in prison because either punishment ensures he will never be released from custody.

And that, he said, is unfair because he believes he was wrongly convicted.

“How can an innocent man be satisfied or happy with spending the rest of his life in prison for something he didn’t do?” Dally said. “Life imprisonment is a living hell. There is no life.”

The former grocery store worker called KVEN-AM (1450) on Tuesday afternoon and discussed a broad range of topics related to his case, including his testimony in the penalty phase of his trial and his relationship with co-defendant and ex-lover Diana Haun.

Haun, 37, was convicted of the same charges last fall and sentenced to life in prison without parole. Dally said he regretted having an affair with her and said he now believes she was the one responsible for Sherri Dally’s murder.

“If I wasn’t with Diana Haun, my wife would still be alive,” he said.

In response to questions about his decision to testify in the penalty phase, Dally said he wanted jurors “to know the man they convicted was innocent.”

When the jury deadlocked at the end of the penalty phase, Dally said, he believed the jurors realized they had made a mistake.

“I am innocent,” he said. “I would never hurt my wife.”