Slaying Suspect Created Web of Lies, Prosecutor Says

NEWPORT, Ore. —  Christian Longo, who admits killing his wife and youngest daughter but denies killing his two older children, is so accustomed to lying that he concocted a story blaming his wife for two of the deaths, a prosecutor said Thursday in closing arguments.

Prosecutors accuse Longo, 29, of murdering his wife and all three children.

Longo testified this week that he strangled his wife, MaryJane, in a fit of rage after she killed the couple’s two older children and severely injured the youngest.

He said he then killed the youngest, Madison, 2, when he realized she was still breathing. Longo testified he then drove around the Newport area searching for his other children -- Zachery, 4, and Sadie, 3 -- on Dec. 18, 2001, stopping at 8 a.m. to visit a Starbucks coffee shop.

The case is scheduled to go to a jury Monday.

Lincoln County Dist. Atty. Paulette Sanders mocked Longo’s testimony Thursday.

“Basically, he’s killed his wife without knowing where his children are. That is the story he’s pitching to you,” she said. “When he finds Madison, she’s still breathing. The only child he can find is still breathing. So he chokes her.

“He has just strangled his wife with his bare hands, and his little girl, his last surviving child he knows of. He goes for coffee,” Sanders said.

She walked the jury through numerous lies and petty crimes that Longo has admitted.

“He lied and lied repeatedly -- to his wife, to his parents, to the elders of his church, to his old friends, to his new friends here in Newport. He lied to the police. Now he’s lying to you,” Sanders said.

Sanders read from a police interrogation report after Longo’s arrest, where the former owner of a contracting business told Lincoln County sheriff’s detectives the cause of death “is not a mystery; it’s relatively simple.”

In testimony this week, Longo said he did not know how his older children died.

“Never once did he say, ‘I don’t know what happened to my children, can you tell me where they are?’ ” Sanders said.