A surprise text ended a prosecutor’s questioning Thursday of a former Las Vegas-area politician standing trial in the killing of a veteran investigative reporter, after a long day of sometimes rambling testimony during which the defendant declared that he never killed anyone.
In a hushed courtroom, before a rapt jury with a murder conviction on the line, prosecutor Christopher Hamner asked defendant Robert Telles to read a message showing that Telles’ wife wondered where he was about the time reporter Jeff German was ambushed and killed outside his home nearly two years ago.
“It says, ‘Where are you?'” Telles responded.
Telles testified earlier that he ignored several text, email and voice messages while he was at home, went for a walk and then to a gym the day German was killed. Prosecutors have suggested he left the phone at home as he executed a meticulously planned fatal attack on the journalist.
Hamner zeroed in on cellphone records presented Wednesday by a defense witness that included no listing of the text from Telles’ wife. The prosecutor said it was found separately, on her Apple watch device.
K.M. Cannon/Las Vegas Review-Journal via AP, Pool
Telles conceded Thursday that as the owner of the phone, he could have deleted the message. He did not admit that he did.
Hamner noted the time – 10:30 a.m. on Sept. 2, 2022 – was the time security video presented earlier to the jury showed a maroon SUV that Telles has agreed looked just like his in German’s neighborhood. It was driven by a person wearing an orange outfit and a big straw hat. Telles himself referred several times Thursday to that person as German’s killer.
Where Telles was when German was fatally attacked has been a key question since the trial started – including during 2 1/2 hours of unusual stream-of-consciousness testimony from Telles.
Telles, a former Democratic administrator of a Clark County office that handles unclaimed estates, has spent almost two years in jail since his arrest in German’s killing. He denies killing German and faces the possibility of life in prison if he’s convicted.
He will return to the witness stand Friday for prosecution rebuttal questioning of police detectives he cited in his testimony, a second round of self-guided testimony and possibly another round of follow-up questioning by prosecutors.
His attorney, Robert Draskovich, said Thursday there were no additional witnesses planned for the defense.
Both sides said they expect closing arguments will come Monday, two weeks after jury selection began.
Draskovich signaled a behind-the-scenes rift with his client on Tuesday, when he got permission from the judge to let Telles testify “by way of narration.” That removed Draskovich from the usual question-and-answer format.
Draskovich didn’t say why the decision was made for Telles to testify by narrative but CBS affiliate KLAS-TV sources said it could happen when a defense attorney feels uncomfortable or concerned about that defendant’s testimony.
Telles told the jury he had been “framed” for blame in German’s death by a political and social “old guard” real estate network resisting his efforts to fight corruption in his office.
“How Mr. German was murdered … speaks to, I think, something or someone who knows what they’re doing,” he testified. “You know, the idea that Mr. German’s throat was slashed and his heart was stabbed.”
“I am not the kind of person who would stab someone,” Telles said as he ended his soliloquy on Thursday. “I didn’t kill Mr. German. And that’s my testimony.”
Telles is accused of plotting to kill German, 69, a respected journalist who spent 44 years covering crime, courts and corruption in Sin City, after German authored several articles for the Las Vegas Review-Journal about a county office in turmoil under Telles’ leadership.
Those stories also included allegations that Telles had a romantic relationship with a female employee. Telles admitted for the first time Thursday those reports were true. German was working on another report about that relationship when he was killed.
German had written four articles about Telles’ alleged hostile behavior at the office. The reporter first learned about the accusations of a toxic workplace from four female Clark County employees. “[Telles] was a horrible, a horrible human being,” one of the women, Rita Reid, told “48 Hours” earlier this year. “Monster is the right word.”
Telles, 47, is an attorney who practiced civil law before he was elected in 2018. His law license was suspended following his arrest several days after German was killed. He lost his 2022 Democratic primary bid for a second elected term.
Hamner and prosecutor Pamela Weckerly rested the prosecution case Monday after four days, 28 witnesses and hundreds of pages of photos, police reports and video evidence.
Under questioning by Hamner on Thursday, Telles said he could not explain how and why his DNA was found beneath German’s fingernails. Autopsy photos show knife or slash marks on German’s arms that police said stemmed from German’s fight for his life.
Telles said he didn’t know how people he alleged conspired to frame him for murder were able to put key pieces of evidence in his home including cut-up pieces of a broad straw hat and a gray athletic shoe. Similar items were worn by the person in orange captured on neighborhood security video near German’s home before the reporter was ambushed and left dead.
Hamner acknowledged that two key pieces of evidence were never found: The orange work shirt and the knife used to attack German. He wondered why people out to frame Telles would have left them out of the evidence inventory.
“Why wouldn’t they put the murder weapon in your house?” Hamner asked. “Does that make any sense?”
“I don’t know,” Telles responded.