A Mecklenburg County jury will have the weekend off before they begin deliberating the fate of a man charged in Charlotte's triple murder case.
The judge presiding over the trial of Justin Hurd sent jurors home late Friday after they had listen to two days of closing arguments in the case.
Prosecutors had spent several weeks building their case against Justin Hurd, calling dozens of witnesses, exhibits and DNA evidence tying him to the murders of Kevin Young, Kinshasa Wagstaff, and her neice Jasmine Hines in February of 2008.
But with no murder weapon and no eyewitnesses, they had to rely on two former inmates who testified that Hurd had talked to them about the murders and the attempt to cover them up while he was in jail.
And so it was no surprise that when Hurd's attorneys began their closing arguments they took aim at those inmates and their credibility.
"These fellas are straw, dust, blowing in the wind, hoping they can misdirect you and blind you with flat out lies," lead attorney Alan Bowman said emphatically.
Bowman would have the last say since he had not put up any defense evidence and he took most of the day carefully going over each witness and many of the pieces of evidence, pointing out where pieces are missing in the prosecution's case.
"They don't have Mr. Hurd doing anything and nobody said he did anything. Nobody." he said.
And in the end he circled back to where he had begun in opening statements suggesting that prosecutors had not proved their case.
"There's no evidence. There's reasonable doubt," Bowman said.
Along with the murder charges, the jury will also have to consider kidnapping and arson charges against Hurd.
If they find her guilty on the murder charges, they will have to decide if he should face the death penalty.
The judge presiding over the trial of Justin Hurd sent jurors home late Friday after they had listen to two days of closing arguments in the case.
Prosecutors had spent several weeks building their case against Justin Hurd, calling dozens of witnesses, exhibits and DNA evidence tying him to the murders of Kevin Young, Kinshasa Wagstaff, and her neice Jasmine Hines in February of 2008.
But with no murder weapon and no eyewitnesses, they had to rely on two former inmates who testified that Hurd had talked to them about the murders and the attempt to cover them up while he was in jail.
And so it was no surprise that when Hurd's attorneys began their closing arguments they took aim at those inmates and their credibility.
"These fellas are straw, dust, blowing in the wind, hoping they can misdirect you and blind you with flat out lies," lead attorney Alan Bowman said emphatically.
Bowman would have the last say since he had not put up any defense evidence and he took most of the day carefully going over each witness and many of the pieces of evidence, pointing out where pieces are missing in the prosecution's case.
"They don't have Mr. Hurd doing anything and nobody said he did anything. Nobody." he said.
And in the end he circled back to where he had begun in opening statements suggesting that prosecutors had not proved their case.
"There's no evidence. There's reasonable doubt," Bowman said.
Along with the murder charges, the jury will also have to consider kidnapping and arson charges against Hurd.
If they find her guilty on the murder charges, they will have to decide if he should face the death penalty.
WSOC
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