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DNA Expert, Ex-Girlfriend Testify in Bentler Trial
KEOSAUQUA (AP) - Crime lab investigators say they found one shooting victim's blood on defendant Shawn Bentler's clothing.
The 23-year-old Illinois man is on trial for mass murder, accused of shooting his entire family to death last October in Bonaparte. Investigators say that two drops of blood on one of Bentler's socks belonged to his mother. Prosecutors say the 22-caliber rifle found in the ditch near the Bentler home was used to kill at least one member of the family. But no fingerprints or other evidence tie it to Shawn Bentler. But a DCI lab investigator did find that kind of evidence on a sock. Agent Halverson says Shawn Bentler's ankle socks were taken as evidence when he was picked up in Quincy, Ill., just hours after the shootings. The DNA test confirmed the small spots were blood and blood from one of the mass murder victims. A lab agent says the size of the drops on one sock suggest to him it didn't result from something simple like a cut finger. "If blood is dropping from a cut finger it'll make a larger stain. It took some sort of impact to break it up and make the stains that small," said Halverson. Bentler claims he was at home at the time of the slayings. Defense attorneys have said that Sandra Bentler did her son's laundry, and alluded that the blood could have transferred that way. Another key piece of testimony came from Bentler's ex-girlfriend and mother of one of his children, Lexie Leslie told the court things Bentler said before his family was shot to death. Leslie says it was her habit to joke around and use a phrase she would murder someone who annoyed her. Leslie and Shawn Bentler had a child together and once they were together she made her murder comment and was shocked at what her former boyfriend said next. Leslie said she had problems getting Bentler to pay child support and was constantly complaining about it. She said Bentler also complained at times about his family, especially his father. But she took what he said about inheritance as more daydreaming than a threat. More Good Stuff |
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