Jury deliberates on fate of former politician accused of killing investigative journalist in Las Vegas

LAS VEGAS (AP) — A jury began deliberating Monday in the trial of a former Las Vegas-area Democratic politician accused of killing an investigative journalist whom prosecutors say the man accused of writing stories that destroyed his career, ruined his reputation and threatened his marriage.

“And he did it because Jeff hadn’t finished writing,” prosecutor Christopher Hamner said during closing arguments for defendant Robert Telles and journalist Jeff German. “It’s like connecting the dots.”

Jurors deliberated for about two and a half hours before sending a note to the judge around 4:15 p.m. asking for more paper and a forensic technician to show them how to zoom in on the laptop video while they were in the jury room. They returned to deliberations and stayed past the trial's usual end time of 5 p.m.

Telles lost his Democratic primary for a second term after German first reported for the Las Vegas Review-Journal in May 2022 about Telles’ conduct as head of a shadowy county office that handles unclaimed estates. The articles described unrest and bullying at Telles’ workplace and a romantic relationship between Telles and a female employee.

The day before German’s murder, Telles had learned that Clark County authorities were about to provide German with the emails and text messages Telles and the woman had shared, in response to the reporter’s request to view public records. Another story was in the works, Hamner said.

“The murder occurred the next day … approximately 15 hours later,” prosecutor Pamela Weckerly said as she presented the jury with a timeline and videos of Telles’ brown SUV leaving the neighborhood near his home shortly after 9 a.m. on Sept. 2, 2022, and driving through the streets near German’s home shortly after.

The driver of the SUV was seen wearing a bright orange outfit similar to one worn by a person filmed walking toward German's home and slipping into a side yard.

“This person is just lying in wait,” Weckerly said, replaying video from a neighbor’s house showing German’s garage door rise and German enter the side yard where he was attacked just after 11:15 a.m.

A little over two minutes pass, then the orange figure appears and walks down a sidewalk. German does not reappear.

The prosecutor said the killing was first-degree murder because the evidence showed it was willful, deliberate and premeditated. Although prosecutors do not have the murder weapon in their possession, she said the evidence clearly showed a weapon was used.

Weckerly also focused on a text message from Telles' wife, to which he did not respond, asking, “Where are you?” about 45 minutes before evidence showed German was killed.

Hamner and Weckerly told the jury they believed Telles did not respond because he had left his cellphone – and its ability to track it – at home.

German's body was found the next day and Telles' DNA was found under German's fingernails. When asked about the DNA, Telles said he believed it had been implanted.

No traces of German's blood or DNA were found on Telles, in his vehicle or at his home, defense attorney Robert Draskovich said Monday, urging the jury to “ask what's missing.”

Draskovich first presented a new video clip, focusing on a view of a brown SUV like Telles', seen through the passenger window with the shadowy silhouette of a driver behind the wheel. The image was a piece of prosecution evidence that had not been shown to the jury.

The driver was not Telles, the lawyer said, stressing that his client is completely bald.

The jury again heard about cut-up pieces of a large straw hat and a gray athletic shoe found at Telles's that resembled those worn by the person wearing the orange shirt, who was never found.

“You are the sole judges of the facts,” Draskovich told the jury in his closing argument before the panel was whittled down to 12, broke for lunch and began just before 2 p.m. to deliberate whether they all believe Telles murdered German.

“I’m not crazy. I’m not trying to avoid responsibility,” Telles told the jury Friday, after giving his second and final self-guided defense testimony. “I did not kill Mr. German and I am innocent.”

The testimony came on the day German would have turned 71. A Milwaukee native, he was a respected journalist who spent 44 years covering crime, courts and corruption in Las Vegas.

Telles, 47, is a lawyer who practiced civil law before being elected in 2018. His license was suspended after he was arrested days after German’s murder. He faces life in prison if convicted.

Jurors were attentive throughout the trial, watching Telles on the witness stand and at the defense table. On Monday, he sat, brow furrowed and eyes slightly narrowed, in front of the computer images as Weckerly and Hamner spoke.

In his testimony, he named office colleagues, real estate agents, business owners and police officers whom he accused of “framing” him in German’s murder. He said it was retaliation for his efforts to root out corruption he saw in his office of about eight estate agents.

“I'm not the type of person who would stab someone. I did not kill Mr. German,” Telles said Thursday. “And that's my testimony.”

Telles' whereabouts at the time German was killed remained a central issue in the trial, as Weckerly and Hamner presented 28 witnesses and hundreds of pages of photos, police reports and videos.

Telles and five others testified for the defense during the trial. No members of the Telles family were called to the stand or identified in the courtroom.

About a dozen members of the German family sat together in silence in the hushed courtroom Monday. They declined to comment to The Associated Press about the case.

The killing has drawn widespread attention. German is the only journalist killed in the United States in 2022, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists. The nonprofit has records of 17 media workers killed in the United States since 1992.

Ken Ritter, Associated Press