Prosecutors say the lead singer of the band As I Lay Dying, who is accused of trying to hire someone to kill his estranged wife, handed an envelope containing $1,000 in cash to an undercover officer, along with instructions, a photograph, an address, security gate codes and dates when he would have an alibi, The Associated Press reported.
Those details emerged in court in Vista, Calif., on Thursday as the singer, Tim Lambesis, 32, pleaded not guilty to charges of solicitation of murder. A judge set bail at $3 million.
Claudia Grasso, a deputy San Diego County district attorney, told the court that the undercover agent, identified only as “Red,†had recorded Mr. Lambesis as he stated he wanted his wife slain. In addition, the singer is said to have twice in the last month told a man at his gym that he was looking for an assassin, complaining that his wife had made it hard for him to visit their three adopted children.
But a defense attorney, Anthony Salerno, told The Associated Press that Mr. Lambesis never intended for his spouse, Meggan, to be harmed. She lives in Encinitas, Calif., near Oceanside, where he was arrested on Tuesday. “Law enforcement was being fed something by someone that I strongly believe was a snitch, was out to save his own skin and was trumping things up,†Mr. Salerno said.
Mr. Lambesis faces up to nine years in prison if convicted. He said nothing in court, which was packed with his supporters.
Ms. Grasso said the singer informed his wife in an e-mail while he was on tour last year that he wanted to end the relationship and that he no longer believed in God. Meggan Lambesis later learned that her husband had been unfaithful to her with “a string of women,†Ms. Grasso added.
In divorce papers filed in San Diego County last fall, Meggan Lambesis said her husband had become obsessed with bodybuilding, seemed extremely distracted around his children, and spent thousands of dollars on tattoos. She alleged he had become an irresponsible father during the months before their break-up, citing an incident in which he fell alseep when he was supposed to be watching his children at a swimming pool.
Ms. Grasso asked the superior court judge, Martin Staven, to set bail at $20 million, saying Mr. Lambesis remains “substantially motivated to kill his wife.†Bail conditions prohibit Mr. Lambesis from contacting his wife or children.
Mr. Salerno said he expected Mr. Lambesis to make bail. The band’s planned 30-city tour that was to begin May 30 in Oklahoma City looked unlikely to happen, since the judge ruled that Mr. Lambesis can leave San Diego County only to visit his lawyer in Los Angeles.
