CENTENNIAL — Jurors in the Aaron Thompson trial have likely reached consensus on whether seven other children in the Thompson home were abused by him, but they may be struggling on whether he is responsible for his daughter Aaroné’s death, a local attorney said.
On Friday, the jury skipped lunch, leading observers to think that a verdict was near. But jurors wound up their eighth day of deliberation just after 4:30 p.m., without reaching a verdict. And that can’t be good news for prosecutors who argued Thompson should be convicted in the death of his daughter, Aaroné, local attorney Dan Recht said.
The jury will return to deliberate Monday morning.
During the six-week trial in Arapahoe County District Court, prosecutors did not present any evidence directly linking Thompson to the death of Aaroné. She would have been 6 years old when her father reported her missing in November 2005. Authorities believe she died two years earlier. Her body has not been found.
Thompson’s girlfriend, Shelley Lowe, who also was a suspect, died in 2006.
“The further we get, the less likely it will be he gets convicted for Aaroné’s death,” said Recht, who is not associated with the case. “Eight days is really long for any trial. On the other hand, they have a lot of charges to go over.”
Thompson faces 57 criminal charges, including child abuse resulting in death. Three of the charges are specifically about Aaroné’s death; the rest relate to alleged abuse of the other children, the coverup and disposing of her body.
During the trial, jurors heard dramatic testimony from all the children — whether it was taped or in person or both — that Thompson and Lowe beat them repeatedly with a belt, extension cords and a bat.
They were also shown pictures of bruises and marks left by the punishments. So the jury may have decided on those charges by now.
“We knew for a fact going in, that without a body, any child-abuse-resulting-in-death charge was going to be a long shot,” legal analyst Scott Robinson said. “But what we have in this case is conflicting secondhand accounts as to how the little girl met her end. I’m sure that’s a factor in the lengthy deliberations.”
In other cases when a jury has deliberated this long, the group typically has by now sent a note out to the judge indicating that they are deadlocked.
If they were to communicate that they were at an impasse, District Court Judge Valeria Spencer would call the jurors into the courtroom and urge them to continue deliberating.
But that hasn’t happened yet. The jury has submitted a few questions, mostly about procedural issues.
If there is a hung jury on the charges relating to Aaroné, the prosecution could retry Thompson on those, Recht said.
Even if the prosecution does not get a conviction on the charges related to Aaroné’s death, Thompson would still go to jail likely for the rest of his life on the child-abuse charges, Recht said.
“From an emotional perspective, they would like to see him go down for child abuse resulting in death,” Recht said of the prosecution. “But they would be sufficiently happy with multiple convictions of child abuse.”
Robinson cautioned that observers not read too much into the long deliberations.
“You want a jury to take its time,” he said. “This is a very serious case.”
Carlos Illescas: 303-954-1175 or cillescas@denverpost.com
