Boston Hairdresser’s Accused Killer Says a 3rd Sex Partner Is the Real Murderer

Steven Odegard (pictured), the 42-year-old Massachusetts man defending himself in court on charges of murdered Daniel Yakovleff in January 2008, took the stand yesterday, in the trial’s fourth week, and insisted he was not the one who killed the 20-year-old hairdresser, but rather another man, whom joined them in an evening of sex, is responsible for leaving a 13-inch knife in the victim’s chest. “He said he told Daniel Yakovleff and the third man to go into his bedroom in the early morning of Jan. 17, 2008, after having sexual relations with Yakovleff. He said he awoke at around 6 a.m. to find Yakovleff in his bed with a 13-inch carving knife in his chest, surrounded by blood. The other man with them that night was no longer there, he said. Odegard said he believes that the other man, whose identity he did not know, committed the murder. His defense attorney, John Swomley, has identified the man Yakovleff was with earlier that night, and although that man has provided an alibi, it has been questioned by the defense. Odegard testified that he passed out hours earlier on the couch in his living room, overwhelmed by the drinks, marijuana, kolodopin prescription drugs, and Levitrol sexual performance drug he took. But prosecutors allege that no other person was with them that night and that Odegard stabbed Yakovleff several times in a fit of rage.” [Boston Herald]