Attorneys make final arguments in Sauk County homicide trial

Courtroom benches were full Tuesday as family, friends and interested parties sat listening to the attorneys’ closing arguments in a Sauk County Circuit Court homicide trial against a Richland Center woman.

Amber M. Lundgren, 38, faces life imprisonment for a charge of first-degree intentional homicide in the shooting death of then 37-year-old Christopher Lytle, of Westfield, in September 2019. The jury began deliberating the charges Tuesday afternoon.

Lundgren is claiming self-defense. She told detectives that Lytle had attacked her after she turned down his attempts at sex and smoking weed while the pair was driving from the Ho-Chunk casino near Baraboo to a secluded turnaround area on at the end of North Hein Road near Levee Road in the town of Fairfield.

In his closing argument, Sauk County District Attorney Michael Albrecht argued that the actions Lundgren took were not in self-defense but out of anger at her own life, which included a “torrid” love story with her ex-husband. During roughly a decade of marriage, she engaged in sexual relationships with other men and was demonstrably treated badly by her husband through text and video of conversations between the two of them.

“I think we can safely say this wasn’t about Chris Lytle,” Albrecht said. “This was about David and Amber Lundgren.”

He asserted that Lundgren didn’t shoot Lytle out of concern for her safety, but instead walked up to him while his back was turned and placed the gun directly on his neck before firing. Lytle fell first to his knees, then face first onto the ground, choking on his own blood, according to testimony from forensic pathologist Robert Corliss. Albrecht pointed to Corliss’ testimony that it was an “execution style” shooting and it was not carried out during a fight started by Lytle.

“The only rape here was of his character,” Albrecht said. “This was not an execution, this was an assassination; an assassination of a human being and an assassination of his character.”

Prosecutors argued that Lundgren didn’t kill Lytle out of concerns for her safety, but to prove to her ex-husband that she was willing to do away with past infidelities.

In multiple statements that detectives said changed over time and in them providing information, Lundgren told detectives that when they stopped, Lytle had become violent. She said when she refused to engage in sexual activity, he pulled her out of the driver’s side of the vehicle before she was able to get away from him and reach for the gun in her purse, shooting him in the back of the neck as he moved to stand.

Lundgren’s attorney, Andrew Martinez, said there is evidence Lundgren killed Lytle, but none to prove it was intentional.

“We have never denied that Amber killed Chris,” Martinez said.

Martinez pointed to Lundgren’s life, which he said has been filled with trauma such as being sexually assaulted more than once in her teenage years and being in romantic relationships that were abusive, as the reason for her behavior.

Forensic pathologist Courtney Endres testified during the trial that Lundgren deals with trauma by avoiding and denying anything negative. Because of the trauma, Lundgren acts as though nothing upsetting has happened, Martinez said. It also affects her ability to tell the truth, which is why her narrative of that night changed more than a dozen times.

“When we are experiencing something, if it is traumatic, it inhibits our ability to record that thing in our brain,” Martinez said.

Martinez also pointed to Lundgren’s behavior in speaking to police as illogical if she had planned to lure Lytle to a clearing and kill him. He said in listening to recorded interviews, Lundgren can be heard admitting to owning the vehicle caught on surveillance footage and that she is the only one who drives it yet she lies about not knowing how it got to the casino parking lot that day.

Martinez outlined a witness who told the court Monday she had been repeatedly raped by Lytle in that turnaround area where he died, referring to Lundgren’s story and the woman’s as “identical.” Prosecutors denounced the woman’s testimony as a spurned lover who expressed anger at Lytle because he did not want to father her children.

Martinez said that prosecutors showed Lundgren had visited a website that sells firearms but failed to present that she had purchased ammunition, not a gun, days before Lytle’s death.

He also refuted a witness statement that Lundgren and her ex-husband beat up a man in August 2019 in Muscoda. Martinez said because the defense gathered follow-up information, the claim the man made about not contacting the police was a lie and that through photos and statements, the man said his vehicle was vandalized by a stranger while sitting near his home.

“All they wanted you to do was think that Amber’s a bad person,” Martinez said, noting that a semi nude photo found in the cache of her phone had nothing to do with the case. “All they wanted you to do was think she’s a slut.”

Martinez said it was clear the detectives who investigated the case lied continuously in interviews to Lundgren, that the man who claimed to be a victim of Lundgren lied and that Lytle’s friend and employer Nick Gray lied about how long he knew him.

“Amber’s lies are the only lies in this case that matter to the state,” Martinez said. “Those lies affected, shaped the narrative that she told. Her mind was fragile, her memory fragmented; they helped shape it for her. Not as a favor, but to incriminate her. That’s their job, but their lies don’t matter. You should still believe them.”

Martinez asked the jury to affirm that progress has been made in how victims of sexual assault are treated. He asked the jurors to proclaim Lundgren not guilty to show that people who have a certain type of sex life should not be judged as deserving of violence against them.

Albrecht rebutted Martinez’s argument by reiterating that Lundgren had made claims of being a “smooth killer” while being held in Sauk County Jail with other inmates and that her changing statements about what happened are the focal point because she’s the only one alive to give them.

“She lied repeatedly to put herself in the best light based on the evidence that was currently available,” Albrecht said. “Her lies are important because she is the only witness alive to talk about this.”

The jury was excused at 4:15 p.m. Tuesday to begin deliberations after being given instructions by Circuit Court Judge Michael Screnock.