DAYTONA BEACH -- Both sides in the murder trial of Edgewater teen-ager Andrew Manos agree: He stabbed his stepfather 15 times, then watched the older man die on the kitchen floor.

But the prosecution and defense differ about whether Manos, then 17, killed William Flanders on July 24, 2001, in self-defense, or if he deserves to spend his life in prison.

Defense attorney Gerard Keating told the jury in opening statements Tuesday that his client killed Flanders after seeing his mother and sibling emotionally and physically abused "time after time."

"The father was a raging bull who came at this skinny 17-year-old kid -- 130 pounds soaking wet -- with a knife and threatened to kill him," Keating said. He said Manos' stepfather was a muscular fisherman who weighed over 210 pounds.

"He told his father, 'Stop! Stop! Stop!," Keating said, slapping his hand hard onto the bench railing in front of the judge for emphasis. "But he wouldn't listen. And there was a fight."

Assistant State Attorney Peter McGlashan said Manos' attack was purposeful to satisfy his anger. "With a depraved mind, this defendant, Andrew Manos, stabbed to death Mr. William Flanders not only once, twice, three times. He stabbed him 15 times. Then he listened to him gurgle in his own blood. First he directed the knife into the right eye. He did that a second time."

Keating said the stabbing was repeated because Manos, now 19, wanted to be sure the man who brutalized his family members would not rise from the floor and kill him.

"His mother was always a victim of William Flanders," Keating said. "Andrew Manos was a victim. These are the actions of a terrified boy."

But McGlashan countered, "Mr. Manos had described his father as an (expletive), but there was no justification for stabbing him 15 times."

McGlashan, who acknowledged the family's history of domestic violence, told the jury that after Flanders was dead, Manos "covered the body, neck to feet, with a blanket and covered his face with a blue Wal-Mart bag."

Manos and his mother, Mary Jo Flanders, then dumped the body off a bridge over the Intracoastal Waterway in St. Johns County, McGlashan said. The mother has been charged with being an accessory after the fact and is awaiting trial.

Joshua Dixon, a St. Johns County lifeguard, testified he found the body in the water the day after the killing and while bringing it ashore, discovered a cement block had been tied onto the victim's right foot.

St. Johns sheriff's Investigator Gregory Beaver told the jury he found a wallet, including a Florida driver's license, in the victim's back pocket. While on his way to the Edgewater Police Department, Beaver said, he was advised Manos and his mother were there filing a missing person's report. "We didn't have a suspect when the body was found and we wanted to talk to his family to see if they could help us," Beaver said.

Investigators were later able to obtain a videotaped confession from Manos, Beaver said.

The trial continues today in Circuit Judge William Parson's courtroom at the Justice Center on Ridgewood Avenue.

henry.frederick@news-jrnl.com