Jason Young breaks down with mom on stand

RALEIGH

Young is charged with beating his wife Michelle to death. She was 5-months pregnant with the couple's second child when she was found in their home on Birchleaf Drive in Raleigh on November 2, 2006. Jason told investigators he was on a business trip in Virginia the night of the murder. Investigators said the killer left the Young's 2-year-old daughter Cassidy with her mother's corpse for hours and her small bloody footprints were tracked throughout the home.

Prosecutors contend the Youngs were having marital and financial problems and Jason wanted out of the marriage. They claim he left the Hampton Inn where he was staying in Hillsville, Virginia and returned to the Triangle to kill Michelle.

On the witness stand Tuesday, Pat Young told jurors that she and Michelle Young's mother spoke about arguments between the couple, but was unaware her son was having extramarital affairs.

Linda Fisher broke down last Friday as she explained to the jury how Michelle confided the intimate details of her relationship with Jason. She said she recalled trying to talk to Jason about the marriage problems and said he told her that Michelle "doesn't want to have sex with him," that's why the marriage wasn't good.

Pat Young said her son did tell her about the couple's lack of intimacy; however she said she did not know about him having affairs with two other women, because she never had a reason to ask.

She said when she later learned about Michelle Money and Carol Anne Sowerby after her son's arrest she was "disappointed."

"I do not approve," she told the courtroom.

Pat Young also addressed Linda Fisher's claims that Jason was not involved much in funeral arrangements for Michelle.

She said she and her son picked out flowers for the top of Michelle's casket and offered suggestions with the planning.

Jason Young began to break down into tears as his mother told the courtroom how he touched Michelle's hand and her belly at the funeral.

During Linda Fisher's testimony, she said she was very upset when Jason moved following Michelle's funeral to the North Carolina mountains to live with his parents, because she rarely could see the Young's 2-year-old daughter.

However, Pat Young said that her family invited Fisher and Michelle's family to Cassidy's third birthday party and made arrangements for other visits.

Pat said she and her son decided together that Linda Fisher should have limited and supervised visits after Fisher got emotional when confronted about comments she made to the media about not really being able to see her granddaughter.

Pat said they decided on the supervised visits because they were afraid the Fisher family would take Cassidy.

Fisher said Friday that the visitation problems eventually led to her and Michelle's sister Meredith hiring a lawyer to see Cassidy. She said after a lot of back and forth about arrangements, she was "shocked" by Jason's sudden decision to hand over full custody to Meredith.

Jason's sister, Heather McCracken, took the witness stand after her mother and revealed to the court that Jason told her right after learning about Michelle's death that she "would make a good mother to Cassidy." McCracken went to say that she was Cassidy's god-mother.

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