Did a man threaten a Savannah couple and the result was the wife’s body being found in pieces by hunters near Riceboro? Or did the husband commit the crime of killing his wife, dismembering her and scatter the pieces of her body on hunting grounds?
Prosecutors from the Atlantic Judicial Circuit and counsel for Nicholas Kassotis, accused of the 2022 slaying of his wife, laid out those cases in opening arguments Tuesday morning in Liberty County Superior Court.
Kassotis faces 12 charges, including malice murder and felony murder, in connection with his wife’s death. But he is not responsible for his wife’s death, defense attorney Douglas Weinstein said.
“My client is not just an attorney and a decorated JAG officer,” Weinstein said in opening arguments, referring to Kassotis’ time with the Navy’s Judge Advocate General. “He is also a man who lived in fear, relentless all-consuming fear.”
Weinstein called what happened to Mindi Kassotis the “absolutely unthinkable.”
“But the truth, what really happened, is far more complex,” he said.
The Kassotises were told they were targets. A man named Jim McIntyre, who claimed to be with the FBI, said their lives were in danger and they needed to go into hiding, Weinstein said.
“Every decision was driven by that fear,” Weinstein said. “Mr. Kassotis lied to his friends. He lied to his family. He lied to Mindi’s loved ones. He lied for years — not because he wanted to deceive them, but because he believed their lives depended on it.”
The state’s first witnesses called Tuesday, after a jury was empaneled Monday, were members of the Portal Hunting Club. Founded in 1900, it is the state’s oldest club and leases thousands of timber tract acres. The club’s territory stretches across Liberty, Long and McIntosh counties, though it was founded by and many of its members still are from Bulloch County Hunters were on the grounds December 2, 2022, when they first discovered a torso in a ditch.
“They were shocked, horrified,” said assistant district attorney Laurie Baio, who delivered opening arguments for the state.
Other body parts were discovered nearby in Long and McIntosh counties.
Hunters called the Liberty County Sheriff ’s Office, and the Georgia Bureau of Investigation also was notified.
Greg McConnell, chief assistant district attorney, conducted the direct examination of hunters who uncovered the remains — with Olin Lovett, trying to find a deer he had just shot, telling the court he thought the torso at first was a hog. After telling senior club members what he found, they called the sheriff ’s office and Lt. Anthony Brown was the first on the scene.
John Murphy, a K9 search expert from South Carolina, was called in and discovered other body parts on December 5, 2022, around 11 a.m. Also found was a knife and a storage tub that tested positive for blood, said Georgia Bureau of Investigation special agent Brett Dickerson.
Dickerson, former chief deputy for Screven County Sheriff ’s Office, testified for several hours Tuesday on what searchers found — including a fixed-blade knife - and what they discovered when the items found were tested both on the scene and at the state crime lab.
Law enforcement eventually determined the remains belonged to Mindi Kassotis, a writer who lived in Savannah with her husband Nicholas.
“Bring your common sense, follow the law, and give justice to Mindi Kassotis,” Baio told jurors to close her opening arguments.
The trial, with Superior Court Judge Paul Rose presiding, may take up to three weeks, according to the court calendar.