Witness: Mangum home had broken knives, broken door

Mangum, 34, is charged with murder in the April 3, 2011, stabbing of Reginald Daye. He died 10 days later of complications at Duke University Hospital.

She maintains the stabbing was a case of self-defense.

In the third day of testimony in Mangum's trial, Almon Brown, who worked for the Durham Police Department in 2011, spent about two hours Monday morning showing jurors photos taken in the apartment and displaying evidence he recovered there.

Steak knives and other kitchen knives were found in the living room and bedroom, Brown said. Some knife blades had red stains on them, and broken blades were found on a sofa, the bedroom floor and counters, he said.

Among the dozens of photos he took that night were some that showed a bathroom door knocked off its hinges, clumps of hair on the bathroom floor and a mattress and scratches on Mangum's face and hand.

Defense attorney Daniel Meier said in his opening statement last week that Daye kicked open the bathroom door during an argument, dragged Mangum out by her hair and held her down on the bed. Mangum stabbed Daye once in the side, Meier said, in an effort to get out of the apartment.

Daye's nephew told police that Daye and Mangum had been arguing over rent money and said that Daye had said Mangum grabbed the cash and left after the stabbing, other witnesses said previously.

Officer Curtis Knight, who was at the apartment complex on an unrelated call that night, testified Monday that Daye yelled, "Crystal, give me my $700," as the couple argued outside the apartment. Knight said he told Daye that he could take out warrants against Mangum for theft, but Daye told him not to bother, and the couple went back inside.

Cpl. Leslie Bond, a domestic violence investigator for the Durham Police Department, interviewed Daye in the hospital after the stabbing. He told her that Mangum had "disrespected him by bringing other guys to the house," she testified.

Daye said neither he nor Mangum wanted to stop arguing, Bond said, but that, when he tried to leave the apartment because she was threatening him, she stabbed him in the back.

Aykia Hanes, who lived next door to Daye, testified that she often heard him arguing with Mangum – as well as the thumps against her apartment wall when things were being thrown around next door. On the night of the stabbing, she said there was "a lot of yelling and screaming from both of them."

Hanes said she looked out the peephole of her front door and saw Daye leave and return, which then was followed by more arguing. She said she never heard any cries for help, but Daye did yell, "Leave me alone. Get the hell out."

"I just thought it was their normal thing," she testified.

On Friday, Mangum's former boyfriend, Milton Walker, reluctantly testified that she had threatened him with a knife during a February 2010 argument and that two police officers had to restrain her.

Durham County Assistant District Attorney Charlene Franks elicited more testimony Monday regarding the 2010 case from Bond and Sgt. John Tyler, who said Mangum "just snapped" and began threatening Walker in front of him and other officers.

Mangum made national headlines in March 2006 when she claimed that three players on the Duke University lacrosse team trapped her inside a bathroom at 610 N. Buchanan Blvd., where she was performing as a stripper at a team party, and raped and sexually assaulted her. Her story about the incident was so inconsistent that Attorney General Roy Cooper later declared the players innocent, saying there was no credible evidence against them.

Prosecutors are prohibited from mentioning the Duke lacrosse case during the trial, with the possible exception of challenging Mangum's credibility as a witness.