- yesterday
Killer Cases Season 7 Episode 5
#CinemaSeriesUSFilm
🎞 Please join
https://t.me/CinemaSeriesUSFilm
#CinemaSeriesUSFilm
🎞 Please join
https://t.me/CinemaSeriesUSFilm
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00.
00:24An individual on foot in a large sun hat
00:28walks up and he
00:30goes to the side of the house
00:32and Jeff Gehrman comes out
00:34fairly rapidly.
00:36And it takes about two minutes
00:38and you can see the bushes rustling
00:40and the person in orange attacking
00:42Jeff.
00:44Jeff has had his throat
00:46slashed. He's been stabbed
00:48in a total I think of 11 times.
00:50His wallet's not taken. His phone
00:52is not taken. There were no signs
00:54of forced entry.
00:56Yeah, it is lost.
00:58Every murder is
01:00tragic.
01:02But the killing of a journalist is particularly
01:04troublesome.
01:06Jeff Gehrman was the quintessential
01:08Las Vegas journalist.
01:10They immediately
01:12try to figure out who might have had an axe
01:14to grind with Gehrman.
01:16We are watching.
01:20You .
01:22He covered all the mobs.
01:24He had done a lot of investigative work
01:26on the Proud Boys.
01:28You better fire that son of a .
01:30I saw it as a badge of honor to be honest with you.
01:34He's coming down there tomorrow.
01:36What a .
01:42Your wife is in a bar.
01:44He says she's got a response.
01:46This is what he's going to tell you.
01:48I'm going to get out of that situation.
01:50And I grab the gun.
01:52Trying to find the first place to put a body.
01:54No sir.
01:55The only thing they could do was kill him.
01:56You want to say anything.
01:58Leave the jury to find the defendant.
02:14911 emergency for BL-1965.
02:16What is your emergency?
02:18I have a neighbor across the street from me.
02:20He's laying in the side yard.
02:22I believe he's dead.
02:24He's got blood over him.
02:28We're making contact with the residents.
02:30We're being cooperative.
02:32Patrol officers arrive after that,
02:34and then detectives are there.
02:36ABC 9, 812.
02:38Give me a call when you have a minute, please.
02:40Copy.
02:44Yeah, it definitely looks like trauma to his neck.
02:46Yeah.
02:48His name is Jeff Gehrman.
02:50He's the R.J.
02:52Reporter.
02:54The victim is identified as Jeff Gehrman,
02:56an investigative reporter for the Las Vegas Review Journal.
03:02Jeff has had his throat slashed.
03:04He's been stabbed a total, I think, of 11 times.
03:06He's obviously dead.
03:08He's been laying there for almost 24 hours.
03:10His wallet's not taken.
03:12His phone is not taken.
03:14They walk through Jeff's house,
03:16and they notice that Jeff's house is perfectly intact.
03:24Clear.
03:26Is the slider locked?
03:28Yeah, it is locked.
03:30It doesn't look like any entry was made.
03:34There were no signs of forced entry,
03:36so it doesn't appear that it's a residential burglary.
03:38Pretty soon thereafter, they get video surveillance from the neighbors across the street,
03:46and they actually can see the murder taking place.
03:50And what you see is an individual on foot in a large sun hat with a bright orange construction shirt,
03:58with a gray bag and wearing gray shoes, walks up on the sidewalk,
04:04and he goes to the side of the house, Jeff's house,
04:08and essentially lets himself into the backyard area.
04:12Maybe a minute and 30 seconds later, the garage door opens,
04:16and Jeff Gehrman comes out fairly rapidly out of his house,
04:20exits his garage, makes his way to the side of his house,
04:24straight to that side yard fence.
04:26He must have heard some noise or disturbance,
04:30and then he's attacked.
04:36And it takes about two minutes,
04:38and you can see the bushes rustling,
04:40and the person in orange attacking Jeff.
04:46And the only one who arises from this
04:48is the attacker in the floppy hat and the orange construction outfit.
04:52That person then promptly walks away from the side yard,
04:58walks back down the sidewalk, and disappears off frame.
05:02The police collect more video surveillance from other houses.
05:07And what they do is they track that suspect
05:10back to a red or a maroon Yukon Denali,
05:14and he gets into that vehicle.
05:16They see the suspect flee in his Yukon Denali and leave the neighborhood,
05:22and then actually make a U-turn.
05:24And then at this point, the Yukon Denali pulls up to Jeff,
05:26the front of Jeff's house, and he gets out,
05:28and it looks almost as if he's forgotten something,
05:30and he's rummaging around in the scene.
05:32This is a terrible and jarring homicide,
05:36one that has deeply impacted Las Vegas.
05:40Every murder is tragic,
05:42but the killing of a journalist is particularly troublesome.
05:46Jeff Gehrman was probably the quintessential Las Vegas journalist.
05:54He had been here for 40 years.
05:56This is Nevada Newsmakers.
06:00As we continue our conversation with Jeff Gehrman,
06:03he's the investigative reporter for Las Vegas Review-Journal.
06:06He's the host of Mobbed Up, the fight for Las Vegas.
06:09They immediately try to figure out who might have had an ax to grind with Gehrman.
06:15He covered all the mob.
06:17He covered all the characters and the politicians who were kowtowing to the mob.
06:23Chicago was the most dominant family then.
06:26They had struck a deal with the New York crime families to basically control Las Vegas.
06:33I mean, over the years, he had done any number of investigative stories.
06:38A lot of investigative work with, like on the Proud Boys and other sort of extremist groups.
06:45You guys did some propaganda about just for Biden, you piece of it.
06:51And police retrieved threats Gehrman had received on his cell phone months before he was murdered.
06:56We are watching you, mother .
07:00You better fire that son of a .
07:03Gehrman was long aware of the dangers his stories could provoke.
07:07I saw it as a badge of honor, to be honest with you, something like that.
07:11And you guys are dead, mother some day, mother .
07:14I'm coming down there tomorrow, mother .
07:17What a .
07:20Police hoped the surveillance videos would lead them to the killer, despite the disguise and the fact that the plates had been taken off the SUV.
07:29Images of the suspect and images of that maroon Yukon Denali were released by Metro's public information office out to the public.
07:39Once the footage of the suspect and his distinctive walk is shown, and once that vehicle is also shown, they are developing names of possible suspects, one of them being Robert Tellis.
07:51Robert Tellis was, at that time, the Clark County Public Administrator, which is an elected office here in Clark County.
08:06In the midst of Tellis' campaign for re-election, Gehrman wrote a series of articles about him, including allegations from his own staff, and a video that appeared to show Tellis having sex in a vehicle with one of his employees.
08:19He talked about the alleged affair, which he denied.
08:25He talked about the turmoil in the office.
08:28He talked about their allegations of abusive behavior by him.
08:32What is your reaction to the allegations from these employees that you have created in a hostile environment in this office?
08:43It's unfortunate that, you know, we've got some people who were here from before, who are basically trying to railroad me.
08:54So he was really upset when the story ran. He emailed or he texted Jeff.
08:59Why did you make me out to be a bad guy?
09:05The story was right before the primary.
09:08This is an important race, and I need your help.
09:11I'm Rob Tellis, and I'm running for Clark County Public Administrator.
09:17Tellis lost the primary election.
09:20So, when police learn that there is this link between Mr. Gehrman and Mr. Tellis,
09:28and when police learn that there are anonymous people coming out of the woodwork saying that looks just like Rob Tellis' walk,
09:36and Rob Tellis drives a car just like that.
09:39At that point, the police believes Mr. Tellis was a person of interest.
09:45They look at a map and they determine where does Mr. Tellis live in relation to Mr. Gehrman.
09:53They start to canvas that pathway for video surveillance.
09:58They track that Yukon Denali leaving the first street from Mr. Tellis' house all the way to Mr. Gehrman's neighborhood.
10:08And that Denali drives all the way back to Robert Tellis' house.
10:12I have never in my career seen that much footage tracking a vehicle's movements from start to finish.
10:21And so the next step was they had issued out a search warrant to collect his DNA.
10:27Because one of the things they learned at autopsy is that underneath Jeff Gehrman's fingernails is foreign DNA.
10:37It doesn't belong to Jeff Gehrman, but they didn't have in their database whose DNA it actually belonged to.
10:44A traffic stop was effectuated.
10:47He was detained.
10:49He was taken over to a local police station, and his DNA was collected at that point.
10:55Because if it's consistent or if it's a match, they're going to arrest him.
11:01I thought, there's just no way.
11:03The guy was an attorney.
11:05He was an elected official with three kids and a wife.
11:09And so it was unfathomable that he would go to Jeff's house and stab him to death in broad daylight.
11:17It just got to be something else.
11:26Las Vegas is a unique town. It's a hot spot.
11:30Seems like Las Vegas is always in the news.
11:33And the murder of an investigative reporter was big news around the country.
11:38Investigative journalist Jeff Gehrman was killed in a stabbing.
11:42What happens in Las Vegas doesn't stay in Las Vegas anymore.
11:44As word spread that a local official, Robert Tellis, was a possible suspect.
11:51Rob Tellis.
11:52Robert Tellis.
11:53Robert Tellis.
11:55And I would have bet my house that Robert Tellis was not capable of murdering anybody.
12:01I had represented him on a domestic battery case against his wife.
12:07Face the vehicle.
12:09A police body cam video of the incident shows Tellis trying to use his position to avoid arrest.
12:15You guys want to take me down because I'm a public official.
12:19No, we don't.
12:21I didn't hit anybody. I didn't touch anybody.
12:23You guys want to take me down because I'm a public official.
12:26That case got dismissed.
12:28And then life went on.
12:29I shook his hand.
12:30He said, you're a great lawyer.
12:32And that was it.
12:34But detectives increasingly came to believe Tellis was the killer.
12:38The man in the floppy hat.
12:40Especially after a search of Tellis' home.
12:44In his garage in a gray bag, there was the hat that the perpetrator was wearing.
12:49And the hat had been cut up.
12:52And then underneath the couch in his great room are the shoes that the perpetrator is wearing.
13:00And one of the shoes is intact and the other one is sort of cut in half.
13:04No murder weapon was ever found.
13:06But his phone held some clues.
13:07On the phone, there were Google map searches of Gehrman's neighborhood.
13:16There were also screenshots that Tellis had taken where he had searched personal information about Gehrman.
13:25After detectives took his clothes and the DNA sample, Tellis was allowed to go back home.
13:30By the time he got back from the DNA swab and the search, the whole area was flooded with media.
13:37Did you do this? Tell us anything?
13:40Why did police throw away your vehicle?
13:43Do you have a comment?
13:45Detectives had asked the DNA lab to do a rush job.
13:51Probably within an hour of getting that sample, Robert Tellis' DNA is a match for the DNA underneath Jeff Gehrman's fingernails.
14:06They go to his house to arrest him and he refuses to come out.
14:19Keep media back. We're going to attempt to call into our subject and have him come out hopefully.
14:25There's sort of a back and forth and eventually it turns into what detectives describe as like a barricade situation.
14:32We're still not getting any compliance for the subject to exit, right?
14:36He was up in his bedroom and he was refusing to come out.
14:39Based on the 405 comments, we're going to go ahead and make the official request for swab and declare the barricade.
14:45405 is police code for suicide.
14:49We do believe that our target is attempting to 405, right?
14:53I think he believed at that point there wasn't any more purpose in going further with this.
14:58Based on his comments and what we are hearing over the phone, the major violator detectives are putting together a plan to make an entry into the residence due to the exigency break.
15:09SWAT kind of assembled downstairs in his home and then kind of calmly made their way up once they established visuals on the Strateles using robots and drone footage.
15:22Copy that, we're making our way up to 88 into the master bedroom. The plan's already been put out.
15:26Keep eyes on them.
15:27We're moving, keep eyes on them.
15:28Copy that, we have the radio.
15:29Copy that, we have the radio.
15:35The tapes are ready.
15:40Good?
15:41Make it tight.
15:43Stand up, you got any weapons?
15:44I'm sorry.
15:45Just the other hand.
15:46We've located the subject.
15:47He's in the bathroom, in the bathtub.
15:50Bleeding.
15:51Slide.
15:53Looks like he's been stabbed a few times.
15:55There you go.
15:56Let's go on.
15:57Mr. Talos had slit his wrists fairly severely.
16:01He was sitting in a pool of his own blood.
16:04He had suffered a lot of blood loss.
16:05Come on the ground.
16:06Come on the ground.
16:07Here, here, here, here.
16:08Bring him right here.
16:09Slide.
16:10Hey.
16:11You got that?
16:12Yep, I got it.
16:13I got it.
16:14Pull him out when we can.
16:15When you can, Levi.
16:16Don't be.
16:17Don't rush.
16:18He's got a lot of wounds.
16:19A lot of significant blood loss in the bathtub.
16:21It was all just superficial.
16:22He was bleeding.
16:23But whatever he's got, he's sort of drugged up.
16:25Can we just let medical know that we believe this object has taken narcotics?
16:30We're going to grab a sheet.
16:31We're going to have to bring him down.
16:32Grab a sheet?
16:33Grab a sheet.
16:34We'll just roll him that way.
16:35Grab a sheet.
16:36We got a sheet over here.
16:37Hand me up.
16:38The sheet right there.
16:39Okay, guys, then put it away.
16:40They're going to be coming down with the suspect now.
16:41We'll pass them off to medical.
16:42Cool.
16:44Ron, what 70 number?
16:44Hello.
16:45What's the 20 number?
16:46Do you want to bring out the engine 2?
16:48All right.
16:49Three.
16:50Okay.
16:52Let's just load it up on the journey.
16:55So, head 4, any art hand, nasal atomizer?
16:59Is that good?
17:00Yes.
17:04He's under arrest, but they're not taking him to jail.
17:07They're getting him to a hospital so that he can get the additional medical care
17:10I'm here to announce the arrest of 45-year-old Robert Tellis.
17:20He was booked in the Clark County Detention Center last night on the charge of open murder.
17:27It was, oh my God, I mean, unheard of.
17:31The last time a government official has been accused of murdering a journalist because of his work was in the 40s in Texas.
17:40Good morning.
17:41Good morning, Mr. Tellis. How are you?
17:44Good, good. How are you doing?
17:45Good. I'm Brian Roth.
17:47Tellis agreed to speak with killer cases, and from almost day one, he set out to prove that police had arrested the wrong man.
17:55So you would be innocent?
17:56That he had been framed.
17:57I've alternated between despair and anger. It's hard, but I'm, again, I'm fighting to prove my innocence.
18:15And from behind bars, Robert Tellis began to fashion a novel legal defense theory.
18:21He was never interested in negotiating the case because he's always maintained he had absolutely nothing to do with it.
18:25You would agree that picture of the person in the hat and the vest, that is the killer?
18:32Yes, sir.
18:33And is that you?
18:34I mean, I have no reason to doubt that.
18:36Is that you?
18:37No, that is not me. No, sir.
18:40Tellis maintained that the person in the floppy hat was a hitman hired by a local real estate company he was at odds with.
18:47Why would they kill the reporter if they wanted to stop you? Why wouldn't they kill you?
18:52At the time, I was actually working on three different types of investigations against this real estate firm.
18:58If I was killed, then it wouldn't stop the investigations into them.
19:03It was clear that, you know, that if Mr. Irwin was murdered, that people would look at me immediately.
19:09Is there any proof of that, that that person exists, a so-called hitman?
19:16I don't have full evidence for it. And that's not for lack of wanting to develop that evidence. It's just the system will not allow me to.
19:24Hitmen don't wear big sloppy hats. They don't commit these murders in broad daylight.
19:29They don't take the time to park on a side street and leave and then come back and pull right up to the house.
19:38Other things that don't make sense is then how did the hitmen, how did they get the hat inside his house?
19:45How did they get the shoes inside of his house?
19:49How they were found in my home, I don't know because those were mine.
19:52What? You didn't put them there?
19:54Are you saying somebody came into your house and planted them there?
19:57I don't know. I don't know if they, I don't know what point those things were planted, but somebody did plant them.
20:04You know, whether they were planted by the police, whether they're planted by her, I don't know.
20:08He came upon the idea of the conspiracy theory right after his arrest.
20:15I think that was going to be his out or his way of explaining things or explaining the inexplicable.
20:23How do you explain the fact that your DNA was found under his fingernails?
20:31Again, I dispute the fact that it was ever found under his nails.
20:35How else would your DNA be there?
20:38Again, planted.
20:40Planted by who?
20:42Who would plant that?
20:43Then again, you know, I don't know.
20:46I don't know what point it was planted.
20:49You would certainly think that there would have to be some type of sign on me, right?
20:53There were no scratches anywhere on my body.
20:58Mr. Gurman could have scratched the killer, but he certainly could not have scratched me at any point because I wasn't the killer.
21:04I think Mr. Tellis is just failing to understand how easily skin cells can get underneath your fingernails.
21:12You can scratch someone and get epithelial cells underneath your fingernails without leaving bloody scratch marks on a body.
21:21So the argument really doesn't hold a lot of weight.
21:23Just so I'm clear, you're saying that was not you driving that car.
21:26That was not you in the vest and the hat, even though the car is very similar to yours and the shoes and the hat were found in your home.
21:35You're still saying that's not you.
21:37That is correct, sir.
21:38You've got it.
21:39That's hard to believe, isn't it?
21:42Yeah, there's a lot about this story that's hard to believe.
21:47You're trying to figure out, does he really believe what he's saying or has he actually convinced himself that he had nothing to do with this?
21:52And Tellis' conspiracy theory also included employees who worked for him at the public administrator's office,
22:00who made that video of him and a female staff member and then gave it to the reporter, Jeff Gehrman.
22:06I was shocked, you know, that my employees would go to those lines, especially since I wasn't a bad boss.
22:17In the workplace, there was no reason to follow me around.
22:20I think he was embarrassed by having that personal detail splashed all over the headlines of the review journal.
22:29That embarrassed him.
22:31Did you hate him?
22:32No.
22:33I didn't know the man to hate him.
22:35You know, to hate someone, you have to know the way.
22:39But certainly to hate someone, to desire to murder someone, no.
22:46Definitely not in that respect whatsoever.
22:50I think Jeff Gehrman was planning on writing a fifth article.
22:55Late July, Robert Tellis is informed by Clark County that Jeff Gehrman has made a public records request
23:03about specific communications between Robert Tellis and the woman that he had been having an affair with in the office.
23:13And that's when he does all these sort of amateur surveillance things of Gehrman's neighborhood and Gehrman's house.
23:24There appear to be over 130 images.
23:27The phone evidence indicates he is surveilling, planning and premeditating this murder.
23:32Robert Tellis had had enough, and he went over to the house, and he murdered Jeff Gehrman.
23:39Leading up to the trial, Tellis had a hard time finding lawyers in Las Vegas willing to work with him on his defense theory.
23:47He's someone who was pretty convinced that he was smarter than everybody else.
24:12And if he got in front of the jury, he'd be able to explain his way out of this.
24:17We are going to take you out to Las Vegas for a new trial against politician Robert Tellis.
24:31He's accused of killing investigative journalist Jeff Gehrman.
24:38By the time of the trial, Tellis had actually found lawyers who were willing to take on his case and deal with his conspiracy theories.
24:45It is a difficult story to tell.
24:50Obviously, he's entitled to his opinion. It's his trial.
24:54At this time, the state of Nevada may address the jury panel and their opening statement.
24:58Thank you, Your Honor.
25:00Prosecutor Pam Weckerly began with crime scene photos to tell the jury what happened to the reporter, Jeff Gehrman.
25:09Mr. Gehrman had sharp force injuries to multiple parts of his body.
25:16All over.
25:18And then she showed the surveillance video of the man in the floppy hat.
25:22A lot of calls come in.
25:25And some of the calls they get are about an individual by the name of Robert Tellis, the defendant.
25:31And then the key piece of evidence for the prosecution, the DNA found under Gehrman's fingernails.
25:37That foreign DNA that was found in those fingernail clippings taken from autopsy of Jeff Gehrman, that foreign DNA is consistent with Robert Tellis.
25:49But prosecutors also knew they had to deal with Tellis likely taking the stand and laying out his conspiracy theories.
25:56As prosecutors, we're always concerned that there's going to be one juror who is confused by something.
26:05In the end, this case isn't about politics.
26:12It's just about murder.
26:14And at the end of the presentation of the evidence, we'll ask you to hold him responsible for his conduct.
26:19The state has shown you and will show you many more pictures of the DNA that's claimed to have been found under Jeff Gehrman's nails.
26:38What's very important, and we'd ask you to take into account all of the evidence or the lack of the evidence in this case, is that no blood whatsoever is found on Mr. Tellis.
26:55These articles were not a motive for a murder.
26:58He made a lot of far more able people, far more violent people upset with him.
27:05He often had people threatening him.
27:10You better fire that son of a bitch.
27:12I'm coming down there tomorrow, mother f***er.
27:16The defense can't prove if any of those gentlemen did this.
27:19We're not saying they did.
27:20We don't know.
27:22But there's a bigger picture.
27:23And at the close of this case, we are going to ask you to return a verdict of not guilty.
27:30Please state and spell your first and last name for the record.
27:38Prosecutors introduced a series of detectives and crime scene forensic specialists to make their case.
27:45The evidence that we collected, it was incredibly thorough.
27:48From the video evidence to the phone evidence to the physical evidence to the DNA evidence, I mean, it was absolutely overwhelming.
27:54But unlike many murder cases, prosecutors purposely did not spend much time trying to gain sympathy for the victim, the reporter, Jeff Garrett.
28:04We were concerned that maybe prospective jurors would have something against reporters.
28:10You know, would they hold that against us having a victim like that?
28:15Please state and spell if your first and last name for the record.
28:22My name is Roberta Lee Kennett.
28:24Roberta Lee Kennett was the woman who had an affair with TELUS, seen in the video published by Jeff Gehrman.
28:31She was significant for a couple of reasons.
28:35He made it abundantly clear to her that he hated Jeff Gehrman.
28:38Did he ever tell you he hated him?
28:41Yes.
28:41I assume that was after the story was written.
28:45Yes.
28:46The other portion of her testimony that was significant were the communications regarding the Yukon Denali.
28:54You sent a message, Rob WTF, please do not be driving your Yukon around for a while.
29:01Correct.
29:02What had you seen that made you send that message to you?
29:06I think what everyone else saw, that Yukon in the photos.
29:10Okay, and then, and then I'm freaking out.
29:14Where I'm, and then are you starting to get nervous?
29:17Yeah, I'm starting to suspect.
29:19And then you say, um, if your car is identical.
29:24Okay, yeah.
29:28Correct.
29:30We're going to call Mr. TELUS.
29:32We're going to do the defense calls.
29:33Mr. R. TELUS.
29:34Please raise your right hand.
29:44Do you do solemnly swear the testimony of your God's given this action shall be the truth.
29:48He testified in a fairly rare and unconventional way.
29:54It was by narrative.
29:55So please tell us.
29:59Begin with your story.
30:01Sure.
30:02Thank you, sir.
30:03And so, first of all, and excuse me, I'm just a little nervous.
30:07This is, uh, it's a day I've been waiting for for nearly two years.
30:12You know, this thing has been kind of a nightmare, frankly.
30:14Um, and again, I want to thank you for being here.
30:19And, uh, and right now I want to say unequivocal.
30:22I'm innocent.
30:23I didn't kill Mr. Gurman.
30:25You know, somebody framed me for this.
30:28And, and I believe that it's Compass Realty.
30:30And I believe that it's for the work that I've done against them.
30:34Prosecutors say there was never any evidence of Compass Realty's alleged involvement in the crime.
30:40And I lost the primary.
30:41You know, it, and it was, uh, it was a bummer.
30:44I mean, sorry, I don't know, like, you know, it was unfortunate.
30:49And, but I continued to fight against Compass Realty.
30:51And I think that that's something that they didn't expect.
30:55It's this really winding, um, meandering story that is involving, like, a real estate company and Metro Police.
31:05And, and it doesn't really ever account for any of the evidence in the case.
31:10So, I've never beat anybody up.
31:19I've never killed anybody.
31:21You, I didn't, I didn't kill Mr. Gurman.
31:30And that's my testimony.
31:32When's the last high-profile murder case you remember where the defendant voluntarily gets on the stand and opens himself up to cross-examination to tell his side of the story?
31:51Do you believe this was a professional hit?
31:56And that's what I believe.
31:58Okay.
31:58The assassin seems to be wearing a giant sun hat.
32:02Um, it's a pretty big hat, right?
32:06Yes, sir.
32:07Fairly noticeable, right?
32:09Yes, sir.
32:09You, you believe that professional assassins want to draw attention to themselves when they're tearing out murder?
32:15When, when they're framing someone?
32:16Yes, sir.
32:17So, the answer to my question is yes.
32:18You believe professional assassins like to draw attention to people?
32:22It depends on what the nature of their goal is.
32:24And if it's to frame someone?
32:25Yes, sir.
32:26A professional killer killed someone in broad daylight, made it a point to park on a completely different street, but then for some reason said, oops, I forgot something and drove all the way back.
32:35My belief is that he wanted to make sure to commit the crime, and then when he was done, he wanted to make sure the SUV was seen in front of the house.
32:44Do you believe that was all part of the plan?
32:46I do.
32:47It wasn't, it wasn't me.
32:49He was terrible when talking about DNA.
32:52He couldn't even bring himself to say it was planted.
32:54You're not disputing that your DNA is underneath Mr. Gareman's fingernails, are you?
33:01Yes, I am.
33:01But you've heard the testimony.
33:03It's there, correct?
33:04I don't know if it was there or at what point it might have gotten there, sir.
33:08Okay.
33:08I'm not asking you how it got there.
33:11Are you really denying that your DNA is underneath the fingernails?
33:14Without knowing the truth, yes, I am.
33:16So you, oh, the DNA labs in on it too?
33:20I don't know.
33:20I don't know at what point, I don't know at what point the sample was collected.
33:24Sir, please tell us, how in the world does your DNA get underneath Mr. Gareman's fingernails?
33:31I don't know because I did not kill Mr. Gareman.
33:33Maybe the one good answer he gave on the stand was acknowledging that there was an affair.
33:41When you sat down, when you spoke with him, were you truthful in your interview?
33:47Not entirely, no.
33:48Okay.
33:48What were you untruthful about?
33:50About the extent of the relationship with me and Roberta Lee Kennan.
33:53Okay.
33:53What was different?
33:54What did you say versus the truth?
33:56I said that, you know, she and I had no affair, but, you know, regrettably, we did have, you know, and when I say regrettably, I think we both regret the mistake, but we both, we had a romantic affair with each other.
34:13Fair to say, in your opinion, if Jeff Gareman hadn't written these articles, you'd probably end up winning that primary.
34:20Uh, probably yes.
34:23The election's over.
34:25You're on your way out, and now this guy is wanting to ask more questions about you and Roberta, right?
34:31Yeah.
34:32He's not leaving it alone, is he?
34:34I think he's still fishing.
34:36Sir, I got a question for you.
34:39The Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department wanted to frame you.
34:46Why did they put the murder weapon in your house?
34:48I think that maybe, I don't know.
34:51I mean, it's a good question.
34:52I don't think he liked me very much, and I don't think he likes being held to task.
34:56And he threw a lot of really big accusations out to a lot of people, a lot of hardworking people, and he deserved to be questioned about it.
35:05And if they hated you so much, why didn't they just kill you?
35:09That's a really good question, and I would like to answer it.
35:12My belief as to why they didn't.
35:13Please tell me, why did you just bother killing you?
35:16Because if they'd killed me, would that have stopped the Nevada State Division from investigating them?
35:20No.
35:21If they'd killed me, would anybody have felt the duty to continue my work because I was actually doing this?
35:27I think so.
35:28So your theory is that Jeff, do you remember this collateral damage?
35:33You know, when you've taken into account the fact that months earlier we had this public feud, it's a pretty convenient way to do this.
35:39So the guy who writes the articles that ends your career, they reward him by killing him?
35:45Well, again, like I said, it was a pretty good way to do this.
35:50But at the end of the day, you're just the victim in this whole thing. Is that correct?
35:55Yes.
35:56Thank you. No further ado.
36:07The state may open and close the arguments.
36:10What do we know about Mr. Tellis' actions prior to the murder?
36:18Well, we know back in August, when he got notification that another story was likely coming,
36:23he kind of goes into research mode on Mr. Gehrman.
36:28All of that demonstrates deliberation.
36:31The length of time of the actual attack itself is sort of a shorter version demonstrating a course of action to kill, right?
36:39In the course of two minutes, you are stabbing someone multiple times.
36:43You could change your mind.
36:45But he doesn't do that.
36:47At the end of his testimony, I think yesterday, Mr. Tellis explained that, you know, he's really a victim in this.
36:57You know, he's been victimized by the whole process.
37:00He was wronged by DNA analysts at Metro who found his DNA on the fingernails of Mr. Gehrman.
37:10And then, of course, he was obviously wronged by Mr. Gehrman's you in the articles he wrote.
37:16Or maybe, maybe it's not that he was wronged.
37:21Maybe he's the one in the wrong.
37:33There was no blood or DNA evidence concerning Mr. Gehrman in Mr. Tellis' home.
37:40In or on his vehicles, in or on his clothing.
37:45None of that would implicate Mr. Tellis.
37:47Again, is that an indication of sudden, wide-ranging conspiracy?
37:52And I'm not going to stand before you today and necessarily argue that there was.
37:56But what that shows is that Metro makes mistakes.
38:01And I'm going to ask you with your open minds and your attentiveness to address those concerns.
38:07And at the close of this process, you find Mr. Tellis not guilty.
38:22We didn't have a 20-minute verdict in this case.
38:25I mean, they deliberated for three days.
38:28They had multiple questions.
38:30You think, like, oh, gosh, this is so clear.
38:33Why is this taking so long?
38:34The jury reached a verdict.
38:37Yes, ma'am.
38:38We stand on the verdict from box to box.
38:43We, the jury, and the above entitled case find the defendant, Robert Tellis, as follows.
38:48Murder with use of a deadly weapon.
38:50Victim 60 years of age or older.
38:57Guilty of first-degree murder.
39:04When you heard the word guilty, what did you think?
39:09Yeah, I honestly just said they got it wrong.
39:11It's out of my hands and it's in God's hands.
39:14And that there is going to be a point which, if not now, soon enough I will prove my innocence.
39:20Ladies and gentlemen, as you know, pursuant to your verdict, we will now go into the penalty phase of the trial.
39:29Let me give you a little insight to the man behind the byline of Jeffrey M. Garriman.
39:36To everyone else, Jeffrey M. Garriman, with a dedicated and respected journalist.
39:43To me, my family, he was our big brother Jeff and our children's loving uncle.
39:50He is so deeply news every day.
39:54Okay.
39:54Okay.
39:59We've been married almost 14 years.
40:06Robert really was, Robert really is a great father and he's a good husband.
40:12And I would love at some point to give my children the chance to have their father back.
40:24With the jury in the above entitled case, having found the defendant, Robert Tellis, guilty of murder of the first degree with use of a deadly weapon, victim 60 years of age or older, impose a sentence of life in the Nevada Department of Corrections with eligibility for parole, beginning when a minimum of 20 years has served.
40:49That was a good turn for Mr. Tellis.
40:54He could have easily been given a sentence of life without the possibility of parole.
40:59He did good in the community.
41:01I think they ultimately came to the fact of, hey, let's give this guy a shot sometime down the road.
41:07Before the judge officially imposed the jury sentence, Tellis had one last chance to speak.
41:13First of all, I want to say that the family has my deepest condolences.
41:20You know, but, you know, and I understand the desire to seek justice and have somebody accountable for this.
41:29I did not tell Mr. Burrell.
41:31And unfortunately, the people who should be held responsible, who should be brought to justice, the chances of it happening now, right this minute, are slim to none.
41:42Yeah.
41:42No, but that said, again, my deepest sympathies to the family.
41:48And I wish them well as they navigate the rest of this tragedy.
41:57And then the judge added eight more years to his minimum 20-year sentence before he would be eligible for parole.
42:04I think being labeled as a murderer or the murderer of Gehrman is worse than any sentence that we could impose on him because he cares so much about how he's perceived by other people.
42:19It's just kind of fundamentally a narcissist.
42:22I think he thought he could get away with this.
42:25And now he's going to go to prison for a very long time, if not for the rest of his life.
42:29And more importantly, it sends a message that you can't go out and kill a journalist for his work.
42:38He was on the job 24-7, and he understood the importance of investigative reporting, and he did it to his dying day.
42:59He was on the job 24-7, and he did it to his job 24-7, and he did it to his job 24-7.
43:04He was on the job 24-7.
43:05He was on the job 24-7.
43:06He was on the job 24-7.
43:07He was on the job 24-7.
43:08He was on the job 24-7.
43:09He was on the job 24-7.
43:10He was on the job 24-7.
43:11He was on the job 24-7.
43:12He was on the job 24-7.
43:13He was on the job 24-7.
43:14He was on the job 24-7.
43:15He was on the job 24-7.
43:16He was on the job 24-7.
43:17He was on the job 24-7.
43:18He was on the job 24-7.
43:19He was on the job 24-7.
43:20He was on the job 24-7.
Recommended
1:33:52
|
Up next
1:33:45
44:49
1:04:46
46:59
43:49
42:44
1:04:46
43:05
43:07
43:05
43:05
58:15