Free Killer Girlfriend: The Jodi Arias Story by Josh Hoffner Brian Skoloff Page A

honestly.”
    It was stellar detective work on the part of Blaney. She was warming up the suspect,
     trying to get Jodi to open up. But really, Blaney just wanted her to confess and make
     it easier to lock her up for the rest of her life.
    “Anybody could be capable of harming another person. It’s in our nature. … Most people
     suppress that,” Blaney said. “What I generally see are the cold-hearted ruthless types.
     What I don’t see very often, Jodi, are people like yourself that are intelligent and
     spiritual and caring and so I tend to believe that it was an … incidental circumstance,
     if you will.”
    Jodi was more closed down than the previous day, barely saying anything in response
     to Blaney’s kinder, gentler approach. She cried when Blaney mentioned Travis’ family,
     and Jodi noted how fond her slain lover was of his brothers and sisters.
    “I can only imagine that keeping all of this in is tearing you apart inside. It’s
     not hard to tell that, you know. You have portrayed yourself as being very strong,
     but you can see it in your eyes, Jodi,” Blaney said.
    “I fall apart when people aren’t looking,” Jodi said.
    “Just because I’m a cop doesn’t mean that I don’t care, you know, about humanity
     and people. I’m not sitting here judging you. I’m trying to help you out. Trying to
     give you a chance to make things right,” she said.
    She then offered a preview of the harsh reality that was to come with her headline-grabbing
     murder trial.
    “When this goes to trial, the media’s there. It’s not kept a secret. Do you want
     to be out there like O.J. Simpson …? You know, nobody respected him aftewards, even
     though he maintained his innocence?”
    Blaney told Jodi that this would certainly be big news soon.
    “Do you want to be portrayed as that cold blooded, cold-hearted murderer because
     the media loves that?” Blaney told her.
    Jodi responded in a soft voice: “You know of course I don’t want to be portrayed
     as a cold-blooded murderer.”
    Blaney went on: “This is kind of a pause, you know, before things start getting heavy.
     This is an opportunity to help yourself out. When the jury looks at it, those are
     the things they are going to be mulling around in their mind when they decide what
     type of sentence to hand out or when they make a recommendation to the judge. Those
     are the sorts of things that turn a jury, and juries can sometimes be fickle, but
     I’ve never seen a case with so much concrete hard evidence.”
    Jodi still wouldn’t admit to the killing, and in fact, most of her answers took a
     different tack as she talked about how she would be portrayed in the media. Jodi asked
     about what would happen to her possessions, including a camera and a couple hundred
     bucks in cash that she was carrying when arrested.
    She asked about her journals and told Blaney where authorities could find them —
     in her fireproof safe. She broke down in tears as she told Blaney that she shot a
     wedding for a couple named Brian and Katie the weekend before and that their wedding
     photos were still on her camera. She said she was happy with how the photos turned
     out as she worked her magic with photo-editing software.
    “That’s the only thing they have to remember the day,” Jodi said.
    “I think you’re not grasping the reality of the situation,” Blaney said, “and hearing
     what your concerns are, you should be concerned for yourself right now.”
    They went back and forth for the next 20 minutes or so as Blaney’s patience grew
     thinner with each lie and Jodi’s behavior became more bizarre. Blaney left the room
     for a few minutes, and Jodi responded by sitting down on the floor, cowering under
     the table.
    Blaney returned and tried to put more pressure on Jodi, seeing Jodi’s apparent fear
     as a chance to get her when she was at her weakest.
    “I’m at the end of my rope,” Blaney said, now changing her tactics. “And what I’m