MARTINEZ, Calif. (Court TV) - In her second contentious day of cross-examination, murder defendant Susan Polk accused the prosecutor of using "doctored" autopsy photos of her husband's stab wounds and accused a former attorney of "setting up" a teenager in a murder case.

"I wonder if that photo has been manipulated by a computer program," Polk said when Assistant District Attorney Paul Sequeira showed jurors graphic pictures of the gashes to the inside of Felix Polk's hands.

"I've cut my fingers a number of times in the kitchen, and it just doesn't look like that," Polk said.

"Right," Sequeira said. "Because you never grabbed at a knife blade to save your life."

Medical experts have testified that Felix's incise wounds on his palms and index fingers were likely a result of trying to block or grab the paring knife Polk stabbed him with in October 2002.

"It's just gaping. And wounds to the hand made with a knife - I've never experienced anything gaping like that," Polk said of one photo, adding later that it appeared to be magnified for exaggerated effect. "It really does look to me like that's been doctored."

Polk initially denied any knowledge of her 70-year-old husband's death when she was arrested more than three years ago. The 48-year-old housewife later admitted to stabbing him, but said she acted in self-defense during a fight amid their nasty divorce battle.

"The fact that I escaped relatively unscathed seems to be a very bad mark against me," Polk said when asked about Felix's multiple wounds on his torso, arms, hands, back and feet.

Photos shown to jurors indicate that Polk had red discoloration around her eyes, bite marks on one or both hands, and a red welt on her shoulder, but no knife wounds anywhere on her body.

Polk was allowed to represent herself earlier this year after firing several attorneys. She was also granted a request last week to have attorney Gary Wesley sit behind her during cross-examination to consult with on legal objections.

By Wednesday afternoon, Polk announced without explanation that she was no longer keeping Wesley as advisory counsel.

Polk also testified that she fired her previous attorney, prominent California lawyer Daniel Horowitz, because she believed he conspired with the district attorney's office to "pin" the murder of his wife on 17-year-old Scott Dyleski.

"This D.A.'s office is extremely unethical and may have framed Scott Dyleski," Polk said. She claimed Horowitz's statements to her implicated him in the "frame job" and that she was prepared to testify for Dyleski.

"He told me, 'I set up Scott Dyleski,'" Polk said. "I was horrified that Mr. Horowitz said that... it seemed to me that he was bragging."

Horowitz and co-counsel Ivan Golde had completed the first week of Polk's first trial in October 2005, when Horowitz's wife Pamela Vitale was brutally murdered. The judge declared a mistrial and Polk fired Horowitz and Golde, but retained their office assistant, Valerie Harris, as her case manager.

Dyleski is allegedly linked to Vitale's murder through DNA, bloody clothes and other evidence. He is scheduled to stand trial in July.

Polk also accused Horowitz of carrying on an affair with a potential juror in her first trial.

"So, he didn't skip a beat," Polk said, "of going from one relationship to the next."

"All those things Susan Polk said are untrue," Horowitz told Courrttv.com Wednesday. "The truth, if I decided to tell it, would be things that are honest, things that would reflect kindly on me as a husband who suffered tragedy, and as a human being."

"If I did say what really went on during those days with Susan, and if I played the tape recording of the things she said were the reasons for why she was firing me, it would reflect poorly on Susan and make it more likely she would be convicted," Horowitz said. "And so I'm going to keep those things private, at least for now."

Sequeira alerted the jury to Polk's charges of a conspiracy since testimony began March 7, in which she has alleged misconduct by the judge and D.A.'s office, accused the clerk of falsifying the record, asked for a second court reporter to ensure the transcripts weren't being falsified, and accused a deputy of threatening her with bodily harm.

"Mrs. Polk, you will make false allegations against anyone ... anybody who crosses you, isn't that true?" Sequeira said.

"Exposing wrongdoing where one sees it: That's what it means to be an American, to be a whistleblower," Polk replied. "I don't make false allegations."

Polk testified that after she survived her husband's alleged attack, she washed the black-handled paring knife - which was "everyone's favorite" knife because it was so sharp and versatile - she dried it and put it back in the kitchen drawer.

She said she wanted more time with her youngest son, Gabe, before deciding what to do about Felix. It was Gabe, then 15, who found his missing father's body late the next evening and called police.

"Did you use that knife the next night? Did you warn Gabe, 'Hey, don't use that knife?'" Sequeira asked.

"Is it possible that Gabe used the knife to eat his dinner?" Sequeira asked. "The same knife that was used to kill his father?"

Polk balked at the suggestion and said she had no idea if the knife was ever used again.

"In emergencies, I get very fastidious. That's just who I am. I cleaned it and put it away," Polk said. "If you think that makes me a murderer? I mean, come on. But it makes a good story, so I guess you like that part."

Susan Polk accuses detectives of staging husband's death scene

By Lisa Sweetingham, Court TVFri Jun 2, 4:27 PM ET

MARTINEZ, Calif. (Court TV) - The cross-examination of murder defendant Susan Polk wrapped up Thursday with the prosecutor questioning Polk about her theory that detectives staged her husband's death scene to look like a murder.

"They were primarily focused on ensuring it did not look like self-defense," Polk said when she was shown photos of her 70-year-old husband Felix Polk's pale, blood-soaked body, surrounded by white numbered place markers indicating shoeprints.

Assistant district attorney Paul Sequeira put on a game face and indulged the defendant's theory.

"Well, it looks as if someone - maybe a female deputy, because they're really small shoes that fit in your shoe size range - maybe walked around the body and then walked to the bathroom. Is that how it happened?" Sequeira asked.

Polk has previously testified that she went to the bathroom to wash her face after the October 2002 altercation with her husband. But she claims she was barefoot, and she accuses investigators of moving Felix's body and pouring water on his head wound to make the scene appear bloodier.

One of her shoes was likely "dipped in blood" by investigators, she testified, and then stamped around the room.

"They either brought blood with them or diluted the blood [at the scene]," Polk said.

"I think you guys goofed," Polk said. "I mean, to put two shoe prints, right-side shoes, side-by-side - like, what, I jumped up and did a whirligig?"

Polk told jurors she "put it all together" during a brief period when she was out on bail and noticed that one of her cross-country athletic shoes was missing from her closet.

"Not only would that have been dumb luck," Sequeira went on, "but some of the prints &- you heard [defense attorney criminalist] Song Wicks testify - some of them were just partial prints!"

Polk straightened up in her chair, fluttered her eyelids and smiled.

"Yeah," she said. "You guys did a bad job."

Polk, 48, is representing herself at trial and claims her psychologist husband was mentally and physically abusive during their 30-year relationship.

On the night she stabbed him, she said Felix punched her three times, lunged at her with an ottoman, and attacked her with the paring knife before she kicked him in the groin and slipped the blade from his hands.

Polk says she sprayed Felix with pepper spray and tapped him on the head with a�Maglite, but that he continued to attack her.

Sequeira asked Polk why she destroyed evidence that evening, noting that she said she laundered and sewed her jeans, threw the pepper spray in the trash, and washed the paring knife, which could have been tested for evidence of her husband's fingerprints.

"I didn't intend to destroy exculpatory evidence," Polk said. "No one would! Unless they were investigating officers."

"You're saying it's exculpatory," Sequeira interjected.

Polk began her redirect testimony Thursday by addressing her children's damaging testimony about her.

She sobbed when she praised her son, Eli, 20, who testified on her behalf.

She said her sons�Adam, 23, and�Gabe, 19, would have to live with their decision to testify against her.

"In time, they'll have to forgive themselves for it," Polk said through tears. "I've forgiven them."

She said that her decision to wash the blade and her bloody clothes was not an attempt to hide a crime, but a part of her nature, a way to get things back to what they were.

"I worked to restore a sense of cleanliness," Polk said. "That was my purpose."

She told jurors that although her�diary, of which portions are in evidence, makes reference to her political views about�Israel, she is not anti-Semitic.

"I never said, 'I hate Jews,' and I don't hate Jews. My children are half -Jewish," she said, adding that she was Italian, British and American.

And although she had attempted to have Judge Laurel Brady removed for bias, Polk said, it was not because the judge was Jewish. She also named a Jewish reporter in the courtroom to whom she had given interviews.

She took issue with the suggestion that she "snapped" when she went to visit her husband in the poolside cottage where he was staying during the couple's nasty divorce.

"I don't snap. I'm not a snapper. I'm not somebody who snaps. But my husband was," Polk said.

Adam and Gabe have testified that their mother is delusional and openly discussed ways to kill their father.

Eli says his brothers have been brainwashed by years of abuse at their father's hands and are now part of a conspiracy to loot the family's estate.

Polk admits that she believes she has psychic predictions and that her husband was likely an agent for the Israeli Mossad. She told jurors Thursday that before her trial began, she successfully fought a court order for a psychological evaluation.

"I'm not going to play crazy. I'm not going to say I snapped when I didn't," Polk said. "And I'm not going to pretend this DA isn't out to frame me for murder and this judge's rulings are not biased, when I believe they are."

Polk's redirect testimony continues Friday. She said she hopes to rest her case by Monday.

Link to Court TV Story at Yahoo!

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