Prosecutors allege Hayes and Komisarjevsky invaded the Petit home, beat Hawke-Petit's husband bloody, strangled Hawke-Petit, set the house afire and tried to flee. The crime shocked the well-to-do New Haven suburb of Cheshire and drew national attention.  The writings, read aloud to the jury by a court clerk during Tuesday's penalty phase of Hayes' trial, were selected from a 40-page letter Komisarjevsky wrote to author Brian McDonald in 2008. They describe the men moving on to the bedrooms where Jennifer Hawke-Petit and her daughters, 17-year-old Hayley Petit and 11-year-old Michaela Petit, lay sleeping.  "All were compliant," he wrote. "This time I took a risk, pulled the trigger, and the chamber was loaded. ... The Petit family passed through their fears and into terror. ... It was captivating, validating that this pain in me was real. ... I was looking right at my personal demon, reflected back in their eyes. ... Hayley is a fighter; she tried time and time again to free herself. ... Mr. Petit is a coward; he ran away when he thought his life was threatened, and ran away to leave his wife and children to madmen. ... I was cheated of my retribution, and so was Steve. ... I am what I am; I make no excuses. ... I'm a criminal with a criminal mind."  Police testified that, after finding evidence of a bank account containing $20,000 to $30,000, the two forced Hawke-Petit to go to a bank in the morning and withdraw money from the account. Prosecutors said Hayes took her to the bank while Komisarjevsky stayed behind.  When Hayes and Hawke-Petit returned with the money, the two men allegedly set the home afire and fled. Inside the home, authorities said, Hawke-Petit, 48, was found raped and strangled. Her two daughters, one of whom had been sexually assaulted, died of smoke inhalation. Petit, the sole survivor, escaped to a neighbor's home.
A court clerk at the trial of Steven Hayes, who was convicted of capital murder in a 2007 Connecticut home invasion, read Tuesday from writings of Hayes' alleged accomplice describing the incident