THE MOTHER OF five children who were killed by their father has asked a jury to spare her ex-husband’s life.
“He did not show my children any mercy by any means,” Amber Kyzer said on the witness stand. “But my kids loved him and if I’m speaking on behalf of my kids and not myself, that’s what I have to say.”
Under cross-examination by prosecutor Suzanne Mayes she added, “I’ll respect whatever the jury decides”.
Kyzer had been subpoenaed by the defence.
A jury convicted Timothy Jones Jr. of five counts of murder last week for the killings in his Lexington home in August 2014. The same jurors are deciding if he will get the death penalty or life in prison without parole.
Kyzer said while she prays for Jones and personally opposes the death penalty, there have been many moments watching the trial when she wanted to “fry him”.
“I hear what my kids went through and what they endured. And as a mother, if I could personally rip his face off I would. That’s the mom in me. That’s the mama bear,” Kyzer said.
Kyzer first testified last month about a brief phone call just before her children were killed and broke down as she read a letter she wrote to her children apologising for not being there for them after the couple divorced.
‘It would kill me’
Yesterday, she sounded adamant and aggravated as she described again how Jones hit her, spit in her face in front of their young daughter and threatened to chop her up and feed her to pigs during their marriage.
Kyzer responded to testimony about herself over the four weeks of testimony, including that she rarely came to visit her children and she shouldn’t have let them live with Jones.
Kyzer said Jones was a good father throughout their marriage and had an $80,000 (€70,500) a year job as a computer engineer.
She said although Jones intentionally made it tough for her to visit her kids by not accommodating her work schedule, she only missed two planned visitations and got her high school diploma and a job because she wanted to show she could support her kids.
Kyzer testified she didn’t want Jones’ family to deal with the pain of losing a son because she lost three of her own in 2014. She said she still has the shirt her 6-year-old son was wearing the last time he saw her and hasn’t washed it in almost five years because it still smells like him.
“If they died thinking I didn’t want them or I didn’t love them, it would kill me,” Kyzer said.
Kyzer’s testimony came after defence lawyers called a social worker to testify about Jones’ chaotic upbringing.
Jones said in a confession he felt his 6-year-old Nathan was trying to attack him by conspiring with his ex-wife, and he exercised the boy until he collapsed and died after he broke an electrical outlet.
Several hours later, Jones said he decided to kill the other children, strangling 8-year-old Merah and 7-year-old Elias with his hands and using a belt to choke 2-year-old Gabriel and 1-year-old Abigail because his hands were too big.
Prosecutors said Jones was an evil, selfish father who killed Nathan in a rage and then the rest of his children because he didn’t want his ex-wife to have them.
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