Zachariah Marcyniuk was sentenced to death by the State of Arkansas for the murder of Katie Wood
According to court documents Zachariah Marcyniuk would break into the home of his former girlfriend Katie Wood and waited for her to come home. When she arrived she was brutally assaulted and murdered
Zachariah Marcyniuk would be arrested, convicted and sentenced to death
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ADC Number
000972
Name:
Marcyniuk, Zachariah S
Race
CAUCASIAN
Sex
MALE
Hair Color
BROWN
Eye Color
BROWN
Height
68 inches
Weight
150 lbs.
Birth Date
05/21/1979
Initial Receipt Date
12/12/2008
Facility
Varner Supermax
Zachariah Marcyniuk Case
On March 9, 2008, at 7:21 a.m., a resident at the Colonial Arms Apartments in Fayetteville called 911 after being awakened by a woman screaming for help. One witness recalled the woman exclaimed “please don’t kill me.” When Fayetteville police officers arrived ten minutes later, they found a purse and woman’s shoe in front of the door to apartment eleven. A chain-link fence surrounding the pool area was “bowed inward” toward the pool in front of the door to that same apartment. Using a cellular phone found in the purse, the officers called Sharon Wood, who was listed as “mom” in the contact directory. She explained the phone belonged to her daughter, Katie Wood, who lived in that apartment. She gave permission for the officers to break into it to investigate. Upon doing so, the officers discovered signs of a bloody struggle in the kitchen. Thereafter, they discovered Katie’s deceased body in the locked bathroom where she had been placed in the empty bathtub fully clothed. Although not immediately apparent, it was discovered later that she had been stabbed six times and suffered a blunt-force trauma to the back of her head. Officers did notice an assortment of wounds to her arms, hands, and face. Officers discovered a partially open window in the bedroom of the apartment. In addition, they also found Katie’s broken key ring and the front-door key bent nearly in half.
As the investigation progressed, Zachariah Marcyniuk became the lead suspect. Notably, his mother and father contacted police because they were concerned for Katie after appellant showed up at his mother’s home around 8:00 a.m. on the morning of the murder in a disheveled, frantic state asking her to take care of his dog and stating that he thought he had hurt Katie. A warrant for first-degree murder was issued, and that afternoon, appellant was pulled over by Lieutenant Donald Kerr of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol for speeding in an area approximately five hours from Fayetteville. The on-board camera system illustrated that Officer Kerr approached appellant’s car and that appellant followed the officer back to his patrol car, where the following colloquy occurred while they were both seated in the front:
Officer: How’s it going? You were going a little fast.
Zachariah Marcyniuk: Sorry about that.
Officer: Where you headed?
Appellant: Amarillo.
Officer: What the purpose of your trip there to Amarillo?
Appellant: I have a friend who lives down there. He’s moving back to Arkansas.
Officer: Is the vehicle registered in your name?
Appellant: Well, my mom has the title. So I was going too fast?
Officer: What kind of work you do out there?
Officer: What happened to your face? It’s scratched. How much do you weigh about?
Appellant: 160
Officer: I’ll just write a warning on your speed, man, so make sure you watch it. We’ve got to wait and we’ll make sure your license comes back good and we’ll get you out of here in a minute, okay?
After dispatch alerted Officer Kerr that a warrant for first-degree murder had been issued against Zachariah Marcyniuk, the officer exited the patrol car and arrested appellant. Officer Kerr immediately read appellant his Miranda rights, which appellant stated he understood. Thereafter, the following conversation occurred:
Officer: You got any idea about a warrant for murder? Did you kill somebody? Huh?
Appellant: No. Not that I know of.
Officer: What do you mean not that you know of? Clearly something gave you a scratch you on your face? What’s going on?
․
Officer: All right, man, you know your rights. What’s going on?
Appellant: I don’t know what’s going on.
Officer: Well, you know you’re under arrest for a warrant, it’s First Degree Murder.
Officer: So you were going to Amarillo?
Appellant: Yeah, I was thinking about going even further, to see the ocean.
Officer: It looks like somebody scratched your face, like a human scratch, it doesn’t look like a dog scratch.
․
Officer: Okay. Where did this happen at? In Arkansas? You’re not gonna say nothing?
Appellant: I’m being honest with you when I say I really don’t remember.
Officer Kerr testified that Zachariah Marcyniuk appeared casual throughout the stop and did not seem nervous. Zachariah Marcyniuk was taken to a local detention center until Fayetteville Police picked him up the next morning.
At trial, the State presented evidence that appellant had been at work delivering pizzas until nearly 1 a.m., clocking out early in the early morning hours of March 9. Several of Katie’s friends testified that she and appellant had dated for nearly a year and a half but that Katie had recently broken off the relationship. Those friends each told police about an incident that took place at a local bar where appellant and Katie had argued a few days before the incident because he wanted to get back together with her, but she was not interested. Katie had indicated that she believed he had stolen her cellular phone.
Zachariah Marcyniuk testified in his own defense and did not deny that he caused Katie’s death. He explained that he was upset about the breakup and desperately wanted to get back together with her. He stated that he had been driving past Katie’s apartment routinely in the weeks since the breakup. He testified that he had “kept after her to recommit” and “was obsessed with the idea of getting back with her.” He admitted that he had approached Katie a few nights before the incident at a local bar and “made a pest of” himself. He claimed that he thought they had worked out their disagreements and might get back together. On the night before the incident, he stated that he left work early and probably went home before deciding to go to Katie’s apartment to return her cellular phone that he had taken the last time he was in the apartment. He acknowledged he parked in a rear lot of the apartment complex where Katie would not have seen his car if she parked in the front.
Zachariah Marcyniuk admitted that he entered the apartment through an unlocked bedroom window. He stated that he used her computer to try to access her email in hopes of discovering if she was seeing someone else. He acknowledged that he did not have the cellular phone with him when he entered the apartment and claimed that he forgot to bring it with him. He testified that he fell asleep in Katie’s apartment at some point, and when he awoke, Katie was opening the front door and screaming. He admitted grabbing her and wrestling with her in the kitchen. He stated that he just wanted the screaming to stop. He said he remembered grabbing a knife, but he alleged that he could not remember specific details.
Zachariah Marcyniuk claimed that he put Katie in the bathtub to try to revive her. He said that he left the apartment through the bedroom window, taking the knife with him, and went back home. He packed a bag, picked up his dog, and drove to his mom’s house. On the way, he drove by Katie’s apartment, but he decided not to stop because he saw police cars. After dropping his dog off with his mother, he disposed of the knife somewhere along the road, and he headed west toward the ocean to commit suicide. He claimed that he never wanted to hurt Katie and did not remember what had happened during their altercation.
Zachariah Marcyniuk admitted that he had pled guilty to aggravated assault a few years earlier after his former girlfriend, Sara Huffman, broke up with him. Sara got an order of protection against him after he broke into her apartment. Thereafter, he drove over seventy miles an hour down the interstate with her in the car while pointing a gun to his head, which resulted in the aggravated-assault charges.
https://caselaw.findlaw.com/court/ar-supreme-court/1525827.html
