Christopher Lovrien is arraigned in Multnomah County Circuit Court on Thursday, March 11, 2021. (Dave Killen/The Oregonian via AP)
Jurors took 100 minutes — a little more than an hour and a half — to convict an Oregon homicide defendant of murdering and dismembering a man, according to The Oregonian. It was the second time in mere months that Christopher Lovrien, 56, was adjudicated guilty of killing someone.
Back in January, he remained defiant as he pleaded down from second-degree murder to manslaughter for taking the life of Mark Dribin, 42, in a long-unsolved 1999 cold case. He maintained he would have won if he could have afforded a private lawyer.
“As far as the court is concerned, I’m 100% in protest of this entire situation,” he said, according to The Oregonian at the time. “The court can go to hell.”
He largely represented himself while recently on trial for killing Kenneth Griffin, 53, who was reported missing on Feb. 2, 2020. The killings were unrelated — prosecutors reportedly called these random and said they found no connections between the defendant and the victims — but by the time Lovrien took Griffin’s life, he had already spoken to investigators looking into Dribin’s death.
In both cases, he maintained self-defense. Jurors only had the opportunity to evaluate the Griffin killing. They convicted Lovrien of second-degree murder and first-degree abuse of a corpse.
Authorities found Griffin’s dismembered remains in three plastic totes in the defendant’s shed. Jurors heard audio, including grand jury testimony in which Lovrien admitted killing the man. The defendant had claimed to drunkenly taking an ax to Griffin’s head and shooting him five times with a crossbow while they were in his basement. He planned to discard the remains in a river, but feeling suicidal, he did not follow through, he reportedly said.
“Easy, cheesy, nobody would have known nothing,” Lovrien said in the grand jury testimony regarding his plan to hide the evidence.
Lovrien started trial representing himself, though he did not deliver an opening statement, call witnesses, or testify, according to the Oregonian. He asked the stand-by attorney, Keith Goody, to give the closing argument. Goody argued that his client lied in testimony and did not kill Griffin.
Mark Dribin, who has yet to be found, was last seen alive on July 1, 1999. The court sentenced Lovrien in January to 20 years in prison for killing him. The defendant will reportedly be sentenced next week for murdering Griffin.
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