Asking the jury that convicted her of murder to let her live, Jodi Arias said in a Phoenix courtroom Tuesday that she never meant to cause her victim’s family so much pain — and that if she was given a life sentence she would contribute to society.

“This is the worst mistake of my life. It’s the worst thing I’ve ever done,” Arias said of the brutal killing of her boyfriend, Travis Alexander. “To this day, I can hardly believe I was capable of such violence.”

Arias, 32, was found guilty earlier this month of the 2008 murder of Alexander, whose body was found in the shower of his Phoenix-area home. He was stabbed 27 times, was shot in the face and had his throat slashed.

Jurors, after hearing tearful statements from Alexander’s brother and sister, have already ruled that Arias had been “especially cruel,” a finding that made her eligible for the death penalty under Arizona law.

On Tuesday, Arias told the jury that during the sentencing phase she had contemplated suicide, saying, “I saw it as taking myself off of life support.” But she said thoughts of her own family kept her from following through.

Similarly, she noted that she had made public statements that she preferred the death penalty to a life sentence. But she said that at the time she had "lost perspective" and now realized the pain her death would cause her family.

“I’m asking you, please, please don’t do that to them,” she told the jurors.

"I’ve already hurt them so badly, along with so many other people. I want everyone’s healing to begin, and I want everyone’s pain to stop."

Before Arias gave her statement, Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Sherry Stephens noted that it was not made under oath and not subject to cross-examination.

Arias told jurors that if they gave her a life sentence, she could still make a contribution to society, something she didn’t realize when she thought of suicide.

“I didn’t know then that if I got life instead of death, I could become employed and self-reliant,” Arias said.

She said she also would like to participate in volunteer programs in prison. Arias said that since her arrest she had made three donations of her hair to Locks of Love, a program that provides wigs to cancer patients, and would like to continue donations. She also spoke of starting a recycling program in prison. 

She said she also would like to teach Spanish and American Sign Language to other prisoners and to help other women to learn to read.

"Along the lines of literacy, I’d like to start a book club or a reading group, something that brings people together in a positive and constructive way," she said.

Holding up a white v-neck T-shirt that had the word “Survivor” across the front, Arias said she had designed it with the idea that 100 percent of the proceeds from sales would go to nonprofit groups helping victims of domestic violence. Arias had argued during the trial that she killed Alexander in response to abuse by him.

“Some people may not believe that I am a survivor of domestic violence. They’re entitled to their opinion,” she told jurors. “I’m supporting this cause because it is very, very important to me.”

Rob Schumacher / AP file

Jodi Arias, seen in court on May 15, told the jury: "I want everyone's pain to stop."

After Arias finished her statement, the judge gave the jury instructions for making their decision on the penalty.

Tuesday afternoon, Arias' defense attorney Jennifer Willmott told jurors that Arias' life should be spared because of several mitigating factors, including the abuse that Arias says she suffered, a borderline personality disorder that a doctor described, and a lack of criminal record. Willmott also said that Arias could still be a productive person in prison.

But prosecutor Juan Martinez said Arias' lies and actions should disqualify many of the defense's assertions from counting as mitigating factors. He asked jurors to remember that Travis Alexander would remain frozen in time at age 30. 

Jurors began deliberating at about 3 p.m. Tuesday. Their verdict must be unanimous; if they can't agree on a sentence, a new jury will be impaneled, Reuters reported.

The Arias case, with its lurid details, has been widely followed. Arias and Alexander had broken up after an affair. Arias testified that she had acted out Alexander’s every fantasy and even converted to his Mormon faith, but he nonetheless broke up with her and began dating — chastely, he told her — other women.

According to testimony by some of Alexander’s friends, Arias began stalking her former beau and slashed his tires. Her extreme jealousy culminated in Alexander’s gruesome murder on June 4, 2008, the prosecutor argued.

Arias dyed her hair, turned off her phone and drove 1,000 miles from California to Alexander’s home in Arizona, then killed him after having sex with him.

NBC News' Diana Alvear and Erin McClam contributed to this report.

Related:

• Take a peek inside Jodi Arias' jail cell
• Character witness for Jodi Arias pulls out, citing threats and inner turmoil
• Jodi Arias should die, victim's brother and sister tell Phoenix jury
• Jury finds Jodi Arias guilty of first-degree murder

In tear-filled statements, the brother and sister of the man Jodi Arias was convicted of murdering told jurors Thursday that his brutal killing had ripped the heart out of the family.

Jurors were hearing arguments over whether Arias deserves to die for killing Travis Alexander in 2008. The same jurors found Wednesday that she had been "especially cruel" in his slaying, which could justify the death penalty under Arizona law.

"Travis was our strength, our constant beacon of hope, our motivation, and his presence has been ripped from our lives," Samantha Alexander, a police officer and one of Alexander's seven brothers and sisters, said in a 15-minute statement, during which she repeatedly had to stop to choke back tears.

Steven Alexander said he continues to suffer nightmares since his brother's death.

"I've had dreams of my brother curled up in the shower, groaning and left to wait for days," he said. "I don't want to have to see my brother's murderer anymore."

Arias, 29 — who stabbed Alexander 27 times, slashed his throat and shot him after he was already dead, all of which she said she did in self-defense — put her hand to her mouth and appeared to wipe away tears as Alexander's siblings struggled their way through the victim impact statements.

Arias' lead attorney, Kirk Nurmi, told the jurors that they could no longer consider the issue of whether to sentence her to die a "hypothetical," because "she's right here. This is the girl right here."

Nurmi reminded jurors that they had pledged to "consider giving life" even if they found aggravating circumstances.

"That is what you committed to do, and ladies and gentlemen, that is what we expect you to do," he said.

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The Phoenix jury that convicted Jodi Arias of first-degree murder last week needed only a few hours Wednesday to decide that her conduct was so extreme that it could merit the death penalty.

Jurors announced that they had found that Arias had been "especially cruel" in killing Travis Alexander in 2008. That would constitute an aggravating factor that Arizona law says could justify the death penalty.

The jury will return to court Thursday to hear new testimony and arguments as it begins deciding whether Arias should die or should spend the rest of her life in prison.

"The last thing that Mr. Alexander felt as he lay there and as he was looking up was this knife and this woman and this blade coming towards him," Deputy Maricopa County Atorney Juan Martinez, the prosecutor, told jurors. 

"And it was only death that relieved that pain, and it was only death that relieved that anguish," he said. "And that is especially cruel."

Arias' attorney, Kirk Nurmi, argued that Arias' conduct wasn't "a matter of cruelty" on its own. Instead, he said, jurors had to be convinced that Arias went "beyond (the) normal cruelty that's inherent in any first-degree murder."

The sentencing phase of the trial had been scheduled to begin last Thursday, but it was postponed without an official explanation. Sheriff's deputies arrested an 18-year-old man the same day and charged him with threatening to bomb the courthouse where Arias was tried.

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Pool / Reuters

Jodi Arias listens during closing arguments in her murder trial Friday, May 3.

Jodi Arias is off suicide watch after an evaluation established that she wasn't a threat to herself — even though she said she hoped a Phoenix jury would sentence her to death for killing her former boyfriend — authorities said Monday.

Arias, 32, was convicted of first-degree murder last week for killing Travis Alexander in 2008. In an interview afterward with KSAZ-TV of Phoenix, she said she would "rather get death than life" and that death was the "ultimate freedom."

Maricopa County sheriff's officials said Monday that Arias had been transferred back to the inmate population at the county's Estrella Jail for women after having been observed on suicide watch for five days in a psychiatric ward, The Arizona Republic reported.

The jury that convicted Arias is scheduled to reconvene on Wednesday to determine whether she should face death or life in prison. 

That phase of the trial was supposed to have started last Thursday, but it was postponed without an official explanation. Sheriff's deputies also arrested an 18-year-old man that day and charged him with threatening to bomb the courthouse where Arias was tried.

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A man holed up in a Phoenix hotel was arrested and accused of threatening to bomb the courthouse where jurors were to begin deciding whether convicted murderer Jodi Arias should get the death penalty, authorities said Thursday.

The penalty phase of Arias' intensely watched trial had been scheduled to begin early Thursday afternoon in Superior Court in Phoenix before the same jurors who convicted her Wednesday of first-degree murder in the 2008 killing of Travis Alexander. But court authorities announced without explanation Thursday that the hearing had been postponed.

Later in the day, the Maricopa County Sheriff's Office said in a statement that its deputies had arrested an 18-year-old man who it said had posted threats on Twitter saying he had planted a bomb in the courtroom and planned to die in a shootout with police.

The man was identified as Laquint H. Cherry, described as "a local area resident." He was being held on a felony terrorism charge.

Cherry resisted officers' attempts to persuade him to surrender from his room in a hotel near Interstate 10 in Phoenix for several hours, all the while tweeting "threatening messages about not being taken alive" and warning that he would "kill the cops surrounding him," the statement said.

"Eventually, Cherry was arrested without incident," it said.

The Twitter account allegedly used by Cherry couldn't immediately be confirmed as authentic by NBC News, but it includes specific tweets cited in the sheriff's report.

Some of the tweets say its user is armed; speaking to reporters Thursday afternoon, Sheriff Joe Arpaio confirmed that "we found some ammunition in his room."

The sheriff's office suggested that the threatening messages were intended for Arpaio as much as for jurors, court officers and spectators in the courtroom. It noted that a new sheriff's headquarters under construction had received bomb threats, and it said "an actual bomb was mailed to the Sheriff, but was intercepted."

"Therefore, our awareness for these kinds of threats is heightened," it said.

The arrest adds another twist to the already bizarre tale of Arias' arrest and trial, adding the larger-than-life personality of the highly controversial Arpaio, 75, to the mix.

Full coverage of the Jodi Arias trial

Arpaio is nationally famous as "America's Toughest Sheriff" for his department's crackdowns on illegal immigration and treatment of inmates in the county's jails. The U.S. Justice Department has sued Arpaio, alleging racial profiling.

Arpaio also was a prominent advocate of investigating Barack Obama's eligibility for the presidency, declaring a year ago that he believed that a birth certificate the White House released in 2011 was a forgery.

He survived a recall petition in 2007 and was re-elected last year with 52 percent of the vote.

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Related:

Jury finds Jodi Arias guilty of first-degree murder

Tweeting from her cell? 'Jodi Arias' Twitter account swiping at prosecutors, pundits

Benjie Sanders / Arizona Daily Star via AP

Lewis Taylor shakes hands with his first attorney from 1972, Howard Kashman, as his current defense team surrounds him after a hearing in Pima County Superior Court in Tucson, Ariz., on Tuesday April 2.

An Arizona man who has maintained for 42 years that he had nothing to do with a horrific hotel fire that killed more than two dozen people pleaded no contest Tuesday in a deal that set aside his original conviction and freed him from prison.

"Welcome back, Mr. Taylor," Tucson Superior Court Judge Richard Fields said after accepting 59-year-old Louis Cuen Taylor's plea on Tuesday, reported The Arizona Daily Star. The plea deal gives him credit for time already served.

"It feels good to just feel Mother Earth underneath my feet, free Mother Earth," Taylor said as he walked out of prison later in the day, The Arizona Republic reported.

Taylor was just 16 years old when he was sentenced to multiple consecutive life sentences for a fire that ripped through the Pioneer Hotel, a Tucson landmark that went up in flames in December 1970 while employees of an aircraft company were there for a Christmas party. 

The only person to speak on behalf of the hotel victims on Tuesday was Paul D'Hedouville II, whose father was killed when he was 4.

"Mr. Taylor, I stand in front of you today to say I harbor no feeling of ill will or grievance against you," D'Hedouville said, according to The Daily Star. "Do not waste your new beginning at life."

Taylor, who is black, claims police pinned the crime on him and an all-white jury gave him an unfair trial. A 2002 examination of his case by CBS' "60 Minutes" found evidence that he had been railroaded and led volunteer legal group The Arizona Justice Project to take on his case.

The blaze killed 29 people: Some jumped to their deaths, others were trapped in their rooms because fire truck ladders weren't long enough to reach upper floors, but most victims died from carbon-monoxide poisoning inside the hotel.

Will Seberger / Zuma Press

Louis Cuen Taylor leaves state prison in Tucson, Ariz., on Tuesday, April 2, after having served 42 years.

Taylor had been sentenced to 28 consecutive life sentences — one for each murder count leveled against him. The twenty-ninth victim died months later from injuries he got in the fire; Taylor was never charged in that victim's death. He didn't show any visible reaction on Tuesday as he accepted the plea deal, The Associated Press reported.

He had been at the hotel that night because he was trying to score some free food and drinks from the Christmas revelers, according to "60 Minutes." Once the fire broke out, police officers and rescue teams asked Taylor to bang on doors and help injured guests get out. Hours later, he was blamed for setting the blaze.

Taylor was interrogated without a lawyer present. The lead fire investigator on the case, Cy Holmes, determined in 1970 that the cause of the fire was arson.

In the "60 Minutes" investigation, Arizona Justice Project lawyers said newer fire techniques found that the cause of the fire was "undetermined" — that there was no proof beyond a reasonable doubt that it had been arson.

Holmes, the lead fire investigator, admitted in a 2002 deposition that his profile of potential suspects included race.

"He's probably a negro, and he's probably 18," he said he told the City Council after the fire, based on years of experience he had investigating arson cases.

Holmes, now 83, told The Associated Press on Monday he still stands by his determination that the fire was arson. 

"There's no question about it," he said. He added that the new findings by Taylor's defense experts are based on incomplete information because a lot of the evidence was destroyed. "They didn't spend two full days digging through that place."

Taylor has always maintained his innocence, and he struggled with the decision to plead no contest on Tuesday, an agreement he reached with prosecutors.

"He initially rejected it," Arizona Justice Project Executive Co-director Katie Puzauskas said, reported The Daily Star.

His plea in a Tucson courtroom came before relatives of some of the victims, reported The Daily Star.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

This story was originally published on Tue Apr 2, 2013 10:25 AM EDT

PHOENIX -- An 86-year-old man who carried out a mercy killing by shooting his ailing wife and high school sweetheart in the head was sentenced Friday to probation after an emotional hearing where family members tearfully spoke on his behalf.

George Sanders could have faced more than 12 years in prison after pleading guilty to manslaughter. The judge, who complimented the prosecutor for being "courageous" in recommending probation, allowed Sanders to walk out of the courtroom.

Judge John Ditsworth said his sentence of two years' probation was "individualized and tempers justice with mercy."

"It is very clear that he will never forget that his actions ended the life of his wife," Ditsworth said as Sanders stood at a podium, his hands clasped and shaking.

"In this set of facts, there was a perfect storm of individual circumstances which placed Mr. Sanders in a position where had to make a decision," Ditsworth said. "This set of facts hits close to home for all of us."

Sanders, wearing khakis and a white sport coat, spoke for only a minute about his love for his 81-year-old wife, Virginia Sanders, who he calls Ginger.

"Your honor, I met Ginger when she was 15 years old and I've loved her since she was 15 years old. I loved her when she was 81 years old," he said, trembling.

"It was a blessing, and I was happy to take care of her," Sanders continued. "I am sorry for all the grief and pain and sorrow I've caused people."

Sanders was arrested Nov. 9 after he says his wife begged him to shoot her at their home in the retirement community of Sun City outside Phoenix. He was initially charged with first-degree murder before reaching a plea agreement with prosecutors.

"The family very much loved their mother," prosecutor Blaine Gadow told the judge Friday as he recommended a sentence of probation, noting the "very unique, difficult circumstances of this case."

"I don't know where our society is going to go with cases like this, judge," Gadow said. "At this point in time, what Mr. Sanders did was a crime."

However, he added, "No one in the courtroom has forgotten the victim in this case."

Steve Sanders, the defendant's son, then spoke on behalf of his father, telling the judge the family never wanted him to be prosecuted.

"I want the court to know that I loved my mother dearly," he said. "But I would also like the court to know that I equally love my father."

Breaking down at time in tears, Steve Sanders explained how his father had been Virginia Sanders' sole caregiver as her health deteriorated.

"I fully believe that the doctor's visits, the appointments, the medical phone calls and the awaiting hospital bed led to the decision that my parents made together," he said. "I do not fault my father.

"A lot of people have hero figures in their life, LeBron James ... some world class figures ... but I have to tell you my lifelong hero is my dad," Steve Sanders told the judge, sobbing. He said his parents had been together for 62 years, "the love of his life, my mother."

Sanders grandson, Grant Sanders, then described what he called "a beautiful love story."

"My grandfather lived to love my grandmother, to serve and to make her feel as happy as he could every moment of their life," Grant Sanders said. "I truly believe that the pain had become too much for my grandmother to bear."

Sanders said his wife was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in 1969, and the couple moved from Washington state to Arizona in the 1970s for the warm, dry climate. She had been in a wheelchair since 1971.

Eventually, his own health deteriorated, and he said it became more difficult to care for his wife.

He said she was diagnosed with gangrene on her foot just a few days before the shooting and was set to be admitted to a hospital, then a nursing home.

"It was just the last straw," Sanders told a detective during his interrogation in November. "She didn't want to go to that hospital ... start cutting her toes off."

He said his wife begged him to kill her.

"I said, 'I can't do it honey,'" he told the detective. "She says, 'Yes you can.'"

Sanders then got his revolver and wrapped a towel around it so the bullet wouldn't go into the kitchen.

"She says, 'Is this going to hurt?' and I said, 'You won't feel a thing,'" he said.

"She was saying, 'Do it. Do it. Do it.' And I just let it go," Sanders added.

As he sentenced Sanders on Friday, Ditsworth recalled his drive home from court the day he accepted Sanders' plea. He said he tuned his radio to a talk show, "and I heard the name George Sanders and my curiosity piqued."

He said he listened for the next hour as about 25 callers expressed their opinions.

Many asked themselves, "What if this had happened to me? ... What if this were me, my brother, my wife?" Ditsworth said. "And it was overwhelming that the general public did not support Mr. Sanders' actions, but they understood them."