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A murderous pimp who watched the TV show “Dexter” to learn how to dispose of a body has been convicted of charges he strangled and dismembered a Brooklyn sex worker to collect her life insurance policy.
After a two-week trial, a Brooklyn Federal Court court jury found Cory Martin, 36, guilty of murder-for-hire in the slaying of Brandy Odom, whose limbless torso was found in Canarsie Park on April 9, 2018. He killed her to collect on $200,000 in life insurance taken out in her name.
Odom’s body was identified by her distinctive tattoo of the word “chocolate,” and cops found her limbs nearby in garbage bags the next day.
Martin and his on-again, off-again girlfriend, Adelle Anderson, lived with Odom in Martin’s Rosedale house — and he was their pimp, keeping the woman in his home, Anderson testified.
Over the course of a day and a half of testimony, Anderson described the murder lot in stomach-churning detail, explaining how Martin watched “Dexter” — a show about a serial killer who murders other criminals and chops up their bodies in a spotless “kill room” — to prepare.
He also watched the true-crime series “The First 48” to learn about police investigative techniques, she said.
Prosecutors said Martin researched power tools and went to Home Depot after strangling Odom, then came back with a reciprocating saw to remove her limbs.
Martin made Anderson cover the bathroom floor-to-ceiling in garbage bags, then spent the next two days on his grim task, sawing through flesh and bone as he wore a black hogging suit and Timberland boots, she testified. He’d strip out of that outfit every time he left the bathroom, to avoid tracking evidence into the rest of the house, she said.
Martin’s defense lawyers put the blame entirely on Anderson, saying that she killed Odom out of jealousy, because the victim was sleeping with Martin.
Martin and Anderson were arrested together on wire fraud and aggravated identity theft in November 2020 for taking out policies on Odom and trying to collect on them after her murder. A month after Anderson took a plea deal in the case, Martin was charged with murder for hire.
Defense lawyer Anthony Cecutti told the jury that Anderson lied about Martin beating and raping her in a cynical bid to win the jury’s sympathy, seizing on an answer she gave to prosecutors about how she lied to police early on in the investigation.
“I always lied about the abuse,” Anderson said, explaining that she was protecting Martin because she loved him.
Assisant U.S. Attorney Emily Dean pounced on that argument during her rebuttal Friday, pointing out that Anderson was talking about lying to doctors about how she got her domestic-violence related injuries.
“Consider that when you have to credit anything he has to say to you at all,” Dean said of Cecutti.
In the end, the jury believed Anderson, and the evidence presented by prosecutors to corroborate her account of what happened.
He was convicted of all counts against him, which included murder for hire, wire fraud and aggravated identity theft. He will be sentenced July 23.
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