The murder trial of a gay escort accused of killing his former boss/client wrapped up Friday afternoon in Denver District Court with emotional pleas to the jury from both sides.
Timothy “John” Boham, 28, is charged with first-degree murder after deliberation, felony murder and aggravated robbery. If convicted of first-degree murder, he faces a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole.
According to four days of testimony, Boham had a paid sexual encounter in late 2005 with J.P. Kelso, a wealthy businessman who lived on Seventh Avenue Parkway. Kelso owned Professional Recovery Systems, a debt-collection agency where Boham briefly worked twice. Boham said he and Kelso hung out together numerous times in the 11 months they knew each other.
On Nov. 13, 2006, Boham went to Kelso’s home early in the afternoon. Kelso would be dead a few hours later, with a bullet hole in his head and a blood-alcohol level of 0.352, more than four times the legal limit.
Boham, through attorneys Amber St. Clair and Kristan Wheeler, said Kelso was despondent over failed relationships. St. Clair said Kelso was a chronic alcoholic who shot himself in the head with Boham’s gun, even though he had been handcuffed by Boham. St. Clair argued that the suicide was made to look like a robbery gone bad so that Kelso’s life insurance policy would pay out, which it wouldn’t if his death was ruled a suicide.
Boham admitted cleaning the body, taking clothing, bedding and a shell casing and throwing them into Cherry Creek. He then went to his mother’s and confessed to her and his sister that he’d shot a man. He also took Kelso’s safe, which he cut open with a power saw. He thought it contained $100,000-$400,000, but it had no money in it. He was arrested a few days later by customs officers in Arizona, near the Mexican border.
Chief Deputy DAs Bonnie Benedetti and Diane Balkin told the nine-woman, four-man jury that Boham was broke — behind in his rent, car payments and motorcycle payments. He had a pregnant girlfriend and “needed to make money quickly.”
“This is a man who would do anything he needed to do to get what he wants,” Balkin told the jury in closing arguments.
Boham’s mother, sister and girlfriend joined police officers in testifying against him, all telling the jury Boham admitted killing Kelso.
Boham, who acted in gay porn movies under the name Marcus Allen, took the witness stand in his own defense, telling the jury, “I got visited by a spirit that told me to go over and rob J.P.”
Benedetti closed by telling the jury, “The cleanup (of Kelso’s house) was frantic and desperate because it was the cleanup of a murder, not a planned suicide.”
The jury will resume deliberations Monday morning.
Mike McPhee: 303-954-1409 or mmcphee@denverpost.com
