MAN, 92, FOUND GUILTY OF 2ND-DEGREE MURDER : PROSECUTORS SAY PANEL NOT SWAYED BY SYMPATHY IN CONCLUDING FILLMORE RESIDENT KILLED WIFE.

Byline: Christopher Noxon Daily News Staff Writer

As three of his children watched and wept, a 92-year-old former postal clerk was found guilty Wednesday of murdering his wife in the bedroom of their Fillmore mobile home nearly two years ago.

A Ventura Superior Court jury deliberated two days before finding Alfred Pohlmeier guilty of second-degree murder, which carries a sentence of 15 years to life. After convicting the oldest defendant ever to face murder charges in Ventura County, the panel will return March 10 to begin the trial's second phase to determine whether he was sane at the time of the crime.

Pohlmeier, who sat hunched and expressionless wearing a headset hearing aid throughout the four-week trial, confessed to sheriff's investigators the day after the crime that he strangled his wife, Lidwina Pohlmeier. But defense attorneys argue that Pohlmeier ``snapped'' during one of his wife's frequent coughing fits that doctors had been unable to diagnose or treat.

Prosecutors said the ruling showed jurors had disregarded sentiment and considered only the law.

``The key for us was whether the jury would be able to set aside their sympathy for this frail old man,'' said Deputy District Attorney Donald C. Glynn. ``I am pleased they were obviously able to do that.''

Defense attorneys - who contended the crime was ``a misguided act of love'' and urged the jury to either acquit Pohlmeier or at least find him guilty of manslaughter - would not comment on the verdict. But Deputy Public Defender Susan Olson said she would introduce evidence during the trial's second phase to show that the Texas native was legally insane at the time of the crime.

Pohlmeier's children wept openly while the verdict was read. Two of his sons testified during the trial, calling their father a devoted and doting husband who had been burdened by his wife's real and imagined illnesses in the years leading to her death.

Joseph Pohlmeier, a Simi Valley telecommunications manager, testified that his father appeared overcome with remorse the morning of the crime. ``I asked him if he knew what kind of trouble he was in and I remember him saying, `They should just take me out and shoot me.' I remember him saying, `They should bury me with her.' ''

In the weeks before Lidwina Pohlmeier's death, Joseph Pohlmeier testified that his mother had complained of a chronic cough caused by a tickling in the back of her throat. Pohlmeier drove his wife to daily doctor appointments and attempted to soothe her irritation with constant attention, crushed medications and even Popsicles.

But defense attorneys said his patience ran out just before dawn on Sept 13, 1995. Pohlmeier rolled over in bed, grabbed his wife of 62 years and held her tight around the neck until her arms went limp. She died two hours later after being rushed by paramedics to Santa Paula Hospital.

Pohlmeier has been confined to the medical ward of the county jail since his arrest. The county pays $8,000 a month for 24-hour nursing care and also covered the expense of brain surgery, which Pohlmeier underwent last year after he fell and hit his head, Ventura County sheriff's officials said.

Defense attorneys had appealed for mercy, saying Pohlmeier can barely walk much less pose a public threat.

During closing arguments, Olson displayed a series of blown-up photographs of the couple grinning over the white frosting of their 50th wedding anniversary cake.

But prosecutors said the elderly defendant deserved the same treatment as any person charged with homicide.

``If you had the same set of facts with a much younger man, the jury would have had no trouble at all finding a guilty verdict,'' said Glynn. ``Because of his age, it's easy to get tied up in sympathy.''