Witnesses paint Frein as tender brother, mercenary killer

By Marilyn Rosenthal
MILFORD — The sister of convicted trooper killer Eric Frein said their household so dysfunctional, their father once punched her in the face seven times for calling him a name.
Tiffany Frein was adopted at age four by Frein's parents. She told the jury Tuesday that they were very abusive, and that Eric was her protector.
She said her adoptive father, Michael Frein, who testified a day earlier, used to come home drunk with his pants around his ankles. Eric would calm her down, and then they would go to his room and hang out together.
"I don't really have a family," she said. "I never really did. Eric is my only family."
Another witness for the defense, Jeremiah Hornbaker, an art director and filmmaker who does battle re-enactments, attested to Eric's ability, knowledge, and character during a nine-day simulation of The Battle of Belleau Wood.
"Eric helped with weapons training and safety," he said. "It was rough work and he was a very reliable and good worker."
The prosecution presented a very different Eric Frein: a publicity-seeking killer after a book deal.
During testimony by Cathleen Cronin from the Pike County Correctional Facility, the prosecution played a recorded conversation between Frein and his mother on Nov. 14, 2014, shortly after his capture.
"When the trial's over, I want money," Frein said on the recording. "I'm not giving my story away for free. It goes to the highest bidder."
He sounds churlish. The intonation of his voice is very different from his voice in the courtroom that day, when he gave one-syllable answers and meekly waived his right to testify. On the jailhouse recording he sounds older, and very angry.
In Pennsylvania, a convicted murderer cannot benefit from a victim's death.
Attorneys talk to the pressBoth sides are gearing up for Wednesday, when the prosecution will ask the jury to impose the death penalty. District Attorney Ray Tonkin said he will counter the defense team's image of Frein as a loner with a miserable childhood in thrall to his father.
"We have evidence that we think will diminish that testimony," said Tonkin.
Defense attorney William Ruzzo said Frein "is not very vociferous about the penalty phase of the case."
"He thinks the case is over," Ruzzo said. "A choice between being on death row and being in the general prison population to defendants is not that great."
Ruzzo will ask the jury for a life sentence without parole.
"Given the current state of politics, it is a mistake to assume that Frein will not be executed because Gov. Tom Wolf has imposed a moratorium on the death penalty in Pennsylvania," he said. "The Trump voters are not exactly liberal. The next governor could be a Republican who wants to get death row fired up again."