FOR OTTUMWA RADIO
The defense team will continue to have its chance today at the Seth Techel murder trial at the Henry County Courthouse in Mount Pleasant.
Defense attorney Steven Gardner is expected to continue to present alternatives to Seth Techel in the May 26th 2012 murder of Seth’s wife, Lisa Caldwell Techel.
The prosecution rested its case early Thursday morning, and although the state presented a lot of evidence that goes toward motive, there was very little physical evidence presented to link Seth to the crime, beyond the fact that he was there at the Techel home when Lisa was killed in her sleep by a deer slug fired from a 12-gauge shotgun.
Gardner made a motion to dismiss the charges against Seth due to a lack of evidence Thursday, but that motion was denied by district judge Dan Wilson.
Gardner has been making the case that a neighbor who had been having problems with the Techels, Brian Tate, could have murdered Lisa.
Tate, who passed away in September of 2012, told authorities he slept until 11 the morning of Lisa’s murder.
Tate has been characterized as mentally unstable, dangerous, and is said to have called the Techels “terrorists.” However, when recorded conversations between Tate and law enforcement were played for the jury on Thursday, Tate did not sound dangerous at all. Tate instead seemed like a strange, eccentric but harmless individual.
It hasn’t helped the defense that Seth Techel himself antagonized Tate in the months and weeks leading up to the murder, orchestrating vandalism to Tate’s property, as he had friends dump dog manure on Tate’s car and yard and throw rocks at Tate’s buildings.
Some recordings of Tate were of such low quality that it was difficult for the jurors to understand what was being said, and there were several minutes of delays due to technical problems with the recording equipment.
What could be understood was mostly innocuous. Tate expressed his fear that Techel or his friends might shoot squirrels in the area with black markings. He seemed confused that people might want to dump buckets of manure into his yard and he expressed genuine concern we he learned that Lisa Techel had been killed. “She had a baby inside her?” Tate asked the officers.
The defense team will continue to have its chance today at the Seth Techel murder trial at the Henry County Courthouse in Mount Pleasant.
Defense attorney Steven Gardner is expected to continue to present alternatives to Seth Techel in the May 26th 2012 murder of Seth’s wife, Lisa Caldwell Techel.
The prosecution rested its case early Thursday morning, and although the state presented a lot of evidence that goes toward motive, there was very little physical evidence presented to link Seth to the crime, beyond the fact that he was there at the Techel home when Lisa was killed in her sleep by a deer slug fired from a 12-gauge shotgun.
Gardner made a motion to dismiss the charges against Seth due to a lack of evidence Thursday, but that motion was denied by district judge Dan Wilson.
Gardner has been making the case that a neighbor who had been having problems with the Techels, Brian Tate, could have murdered Lisa.
Tate, who passed away in September of 2012, told authorities he slept until 11 the morning of Lisa’s murder.
Tate has been characterized as mentally unstable, dangerous, and is said to have called the Techels “terrorists.” However, when recorded conversations between Tate and law enforcement were played for the jury on Thursday, Tate did not sound dangerous at all. Tate instead seemed like a strange, eccentric but harmless individual.
It hasn’t helped the defense that Seth Techel himself antagonized Tate in the months and weeks leading up to the murder, orchestrating vandalism to Tate’s property, as he had friends dump dog manure on Tate’s car and yard and throw rocks at Tate’s buildings.
Some recordings of Tate were of such low quality that it was difficult for the jurors to understand what was being said, and there were several minutes of delays due to technical problems with the recording equipment.
What could be understood was mostly innocuous. Tate expressed his fear that Techel or his friends might shoot squirrels in the area with black markings. He seemed confused that people might want to dump buckets of manure into his yard and he expressed genuine concern we he learned that Lisa Techel had been killed. “She had a baby inside her?” Tate asked the officers.
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