A man who had allegedly confessed to killing his wife, their three kids, and the family dog testified on Wednesday that he is innocent and named his wife as the real murderer.
Defendant Anthony Todt, 46, shifted all the blame onto his late wife Megan Todt, 42, during his testimony on Wednesday. The problem for him, however, is that he had previously given a detailed confession to detectives shortly after law enforcement found him at home with the bodies.
Jurors saw footage of his alleged admission of guilt on Tuesday, in which he detailed suffocating daughter Zoe Todt, 4, stabbing and suffocating sons Alek Todt, 13, and Tyler Todt, 4, and suffocating their dog Breezy.
Prosecutor Danielle Pinnell said in opening statements that sometime between Dec. 14 and Christmas of 2019, defendant Todt killed his family. Although he denied it on the stand, Todt said in his videotaped confession with detectives that he carried out the murders. He said he plotted the deaths with his wife Megan, and that he smothered her with a pillow after she failed to fatally stab herself.
“We had salvation in mind,” Todt is heard saying on the video, explaining the reason for killing the kids. Pinnell told jurors that Todt said that he and his wife believed the apocalypse was coming.
Todt insisted on the stand Wednesday that he did not remember those alleged confessions made on Jan. 13 and 15, 2020. He said he was addled from repeatedly trying to die by suicide using Benadryl.
“Thank God I didn’t tell you I assassinated Kennedy,” he said, apparently injecting sarcasm into the proceeding.
Todt was soft-spoken but combative during cross-examination, pushing to elaborate on his answers and arguing with Pinnell about how she construed events. Throughout his testimony, Todt sounded both even-keeled and belligerent, and while he did not yell or even raise his voice, he and Pinnell often stepped on each other’s words.
“Ma’am,” he said in his typically brusque manner, after Pinnell asked him when he left the home before the murders. “I was on vacation. I don’t know the time.”
Todt said that his wife—and only his wife—killed their family. He told Pinnell that Megan had hid the family members’ phones, and that she struggled with illnesses like Lyme disease. Todt also said that his wife had become interested in Eastern religions and alternative medicine.
“I told her she needed to get help,” he said. “I don’t care what happened. I don’t care what she did. Get help.”
Megan, he said, stabbed herself to death.
When confronted with the confession video, defendant Todt dismissed his prior admission of guilt.
“That’s what the video showed,” he said in a typically curt answer.
Ultimately, he said he had no memory of talking to investigators.
He also claimed to have edited a letter his wife left behind, saying that he gave this letter to older family members who previously died.
As in the confession, however, Todt said he attempted suicide in the weeks after the deaths but he “chickened” out on stabbing himself.
He testified on Wednesday that he was ashamed and that he had decided he deserved to die.
He said he decided that he was going to get a gun, but did not end up getting one because of the three-day wait rule in Florida. Pinnell asked him if he was aware of the waiting period having nothing to do with shotguns. Todt said he was looking for a handgun.
[Screenshot via Law&Crime]