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Mablin guilty of second-degree murder

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By Steven Martens | Saturday, May 24, 2008 |

Benaiah Mablin (Kevin E. Schmidt/Quad-City Times) Buy this Photo

CLINTON, Iowa — After a weeklong trial, a Clinton County jury convicted Benaiah Mablin of second-degree murder in the Dec. 13 stabbing death of Sandra Chambers-Singh, whose body was found by a neighbor in the bedroom of her downtown Clinton apartment.

Mablin, 26, will be sentenced on July 10. Second-degree murder carries a mandatory sentence of up to 50 years in prison, and state law requires that Mablin serve 70 percent, or 35 years, of his sentence.

Prosecutors had sought a conviction on a charge of first-degree murder, which carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole.

Clinton County Attorney Mike Wolf said even though the jury did not return the

verdict he sought, he thought Chambers-Singh, 41, did get justice.

“We have a high burden of proof, and I think that’s reflected in the outcome today,” he said.

During the trial, jurors watched a video of a police interview in which Mablin admitted to smoking crack and having sex with Chambers-Singh in her apartment and then getting into an argument with her when she wanted him to get more crack. Mablin told police she had been trying to check his coat pockets to see if he had more crack and then cut him with a knife she had retrieved from the kitchen when he tried to take the coat away from her.

Mablin admitted knocking the knife out of Chambers-Singh’s hand stabbing her with it, then fleeing her apartment in her white minivan.

Wolf said the fact that Mablin could have walked out of the apartment but chose instead to stab Chambers-Singh 18 to 20 times demonstrated that he had thought about what he was doing.

“Multiple stab wounds take time,” Wolf said. “A person needs to deliberate to do that.”

Mablin’s attorney, Bruce Ingham, said that Mablin is responsible for Chambers-Singh’s death but that the state did not prove he acted with premeditation or malice, which he described as having an “evil heart.”

Ingham also made reference to the fact that Chambers-Singh had been smoking crack and having sex with Mablin while her 3-year-old son, Prince, was in the apartment, saying she had made certain choices on that day.

“What she wanted more than anything in the whole world, including the welfare of her own child, was more cocaine,” Ingham said.

Assistant Iowa Attorney General James Kivi, who assisted Wolf in prosecuting the case, said Mablin made a choice that day, too.

“His choice was to murder her,” Kivi said.

Juror Shirlie Cronk said after the verdict Friday that while the drug use was not a factor in the jury’s verdict, the overall circumstances of Chambers-Singh’s death were.

“I don’t think he went there with the intent of killing her,” Cronk said.

Steven Martens can be contacted at (563) 659-2595 or smartens@qctimes.com. Comment on this story at qctimes.com.