State seeking death penalty in Sedalia homicide

The state will seek the death penalty against Joseph Arbeiter, the man charged for first degree murder and armed criminal action in the death of 35-year-old Mandy Black earlier this year.

Black’s remains were found in a trailer park south of Sedalia in early May.

Joseph Arbeiter confessed to law enforcement that he stabbed Mandy Black several times in the chest in January, but did not dismember her body until spring.

The case was sent to Clay County for trial, and the Pettis County Prosecutor filed a notice of aggravating circumstances.

In order to impose the death penalty, there must be supporting evidence of at least one other aggravating circumstance, among other facts.

The state’s notice alleges that Arbeiter committed murder in St. Louis in 1963 and sexual assault in Pettis County on April 30. The sexual assault case is a separate case to be tried in Clay County.

The state said “the murder was outrageously or wantonly vile, horrible, or inhuman in that it involved torture or depravity of mind.”