Image Credits: @pontebernardo (Unsplash License)

Jodi Ann Arias is a convicted murderer who was born on July 9, 1980 in Salinas, California. During her interview with 48 Hours, Arias revealed that her childhood was “almost ideal.” Arias ended up dropping out of high school in the eleventh grade, worked multiple dead-end jobs in her 20s, and often found herself in relationships with cheating boyfriends. When she took up a job with LegalShield, she met a man named Travis Alexander. The two started a long distance relationship, and Arias started centering her entire life around Alexander. Arias converted to his Mormon religion, hacked into his Facebook account, and even slashed his tires after they had broken up after only five months of dating. Although Alexander had officially called it quits with Arias, the two did maintain a sexual, no-strings-attached relationship.

On June 9, 2008, Travis Alexander’s body was found dead in the shower of his home in Mesa, Arizona by his friends who had become worried about Alexander’s sudden disappearance. The friends had found Alexander in a “pool of blood;” he had a gunshot wound to the head, over two dozen stab wounds, and his throat was slit. Law enforcement concluded that Alexander’s murder had happened on June 4, 2008, five days before his body was found. After investigators recovered a camera, belonging to Arias, in a washing machine in Alexander’s home, Arias became the prime suspect in Alexander’s murder. The camera contained photos of Alexander a few minutes before and after his death, and Arias was arrested in California for first-degree murder on July 9, 2008. Though law enforcement found Arias’s DNA mixed with Alexander’s blood at the scene, Arias originally denied having anything to do with Alexander’s murder. However, she soon changed her story, claiming she and Alexander had been attacked by two intruders and she was coerced into murdering her ex-boyfriend. According to Arias, after she killed Alexander, the intruders decided to let Arias live, and Arias had not informed the police about the incident because she was worried the intruders would return and murder her in revenge.

Arias’s trial began in early January of 2013 and was aired live to the general public. Arias’s defense team argued that Alexander’s murder was the result of Arias defending herself from Alexander’s abusive behavior, claiming that “Jodi’s life was in danger. [Alexander] knocked her to the ground in the bathroom where there was a struggle. If she did not have to defend herself, she would not be here.” Arias testified that Alexander had been physically abusive towards her multiple times during their relationship, and that she was scared of him. Arias and her defense team attempted to prove that Alexander constantly degraded Jodi and had only been using her for sexual purposes throughout their relationship. 

The defense called Lisa Andrews Daidone, Alexander’s ex-girlfriend, to the stand, and with her stated that she had felt used and objectified by Alexander during their relationship in 2007. Nevertheless, the state prosecution team presented evidence that Arias had preplanned Alexander’s murder by staging a burglary at her grandparents’ to hide the fact she had stolen a gun, rented a car, got gas cans to conceal her fuel purchases, and turned off her phone. Arias attempted to clean up the crime scene and cover up her crime by leaving Alexander voicemails hours after his murder, sending him emails three days afterwards, giving false alibis, and consistently lying to law enforcement officials. The prosecution argued that Arias was a jealous ex-girlfriend who had killed Alexander in a callous manner after finding out that Alexander had moved on with another woman. The jury agreed with the prosecution and found Arias guilty of first-degree murder in May of 2013. However, since the jury could not decide on whether or not to sentence Arias to death, the court granted Arias a retrial. The second trial began in 2014, and the jury was still undecided about sentencing Arias to death, which resulted in the death penalty being taken off the table. Arias was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole and said she regretted murdering Alexander, stating, “I wish there was something I could do to take it back.”

The case of Jodi Arias drove sensational headlines during her trial in 2013, and it is because of this coverage that she became one of the most infamous criminals of the twenty-first century. History has shown that criminals such as Ted Bundy and Richard Ramirez, who are considered to be good looking and/or charming, receive a lot more attention and admiration than the average criminal. In Arias’s case, the mainstream media had an obsession with her because Arias is considered to be an attractive young woman who could have had a much better life had she made the right decisions. Also, the case in and of itself revolved a lot around sex and romance, two aspects which are generally appealing to people. According to other prisoners who were associated with Arias, she was known for flaunting her sexuality in attempts to manipulate people and receive special attention from prison officials. This tactic often worked in her favor until the prosecution team brought in all of the hard evidence against Arias.

Although she will be incarcerated for the rest of her life, Arias’s life behind bars is anything but a normal prison experience. In a 2020 Lifetime special, Jodi Arias: Cell Mate Secrets, Tracy Brown and her wife Donovan Bering described what kind of cellmate Arias was while incarcerated at the Estrella Jail in Phoenix, Arizona. Brown and Bering developed a close relationship with Arias and became so close that Arias even helped officiate their jail wedding. The married couple said they were instantly drawn to Arias because she was “friendly,” “quiet, soft-spoken, and well-spoken.” Arias was known to be an artist who enjoyed drawing, singing, and tattoo art. Nevertheless, they also said Arias was very manipulative because she often used her sexuality to manipulate the male officers. When Bering was released from jail, she began managing social media accounts for Arias and witnessed Arias’s calculating nature. Running Arias’s social media accounts was “almost a full-time job” for Bering, and the accounts were originally set up to advocate for Arias while she was behind bars. This slowly turned into Arias asking Bering to attack her critics online, which included Arias’s family members. After Arias’s brutality had been revealed during her trial, Bering told Arias that she no longer supported her cause for freedom, and she and her wife severed all of their connections to Arias.

The main question with this case is this: why are so many individuals still obsessed with Arias and her case? According to Patricia Taylor, a Los Angeles-based psychologist who works with homeless teenagers, one of the main reasons people are obsessed with Arias’s case is because humans have a tendency to obsess over other people’s sex lives. Taylor explains that people love the idea of sex, they love the idea of violence, and they also love the idea of watching people who are perceived as “higher echelon” falling from grace. The fact that Arias’s trial revolved around sex, lies, manipulation, romantic relationships, religion, and a good-looking woman makes her case all the more interesting in the eyes of the general public. However, this obsession with lust and crime says a lot about society as a whole. According to the Thomas Jefferson School of Law, the obsession with Arias’s murder case stems from people seeing themselves as “pegs in a massive and powerful system” to which anyone could unknowingly become the next victim or even the suspect. Walter Mosely, an American novelist, stated in the Newsweek Magazine, “most of us see ourselves as powerless cogs in a greater machine; as potential victims of a society so large and insensitive that we, innocent bystanders in the crowd, might be caught at any time in the crossfire between the forces of so-called good and evil.” People are afraid of becoming like Arias, and the rise in crime shows makes people believe that they too are capable of committing unspeakable crimes. Those who are obsessed with Arias’s murder case tend to be people who have unfulfilled needs or goals in their own lives, and they end up projecting those unsatisfied feelings onto Arias. Dr. Kristina Randall, a psychotherapist who works with conflicted young women, states that people who support Arias are most likely ‘damaged souls’ who feel as if they relate to Arias’s claims of Travis Alexander’s alleged domestic violence. Dr. Randall goes on to state that there are female fans of Arias who might feel hatred for themselves for being unable to end their own domestic abuses, and who now feel as if Arias’s victory is their own form of victory. The overall takeaway from Arias’s trial is that it is easy for people to get sucked into trials and end up creating their own fantasy versions of the defendant instead of seeing all of the facts as they are. However, it is important for people to see Jodi Ann Arias for who she is in real life: a convicted criminal.