Judge is stopping for the day. The video will be played tomorrow. 

Thanks for following today! See you 9 a.m. Thursday. 

Jackson: He woke up to gunshots. He went inside and saw man downstairs. He was messing with dad's gun.     

Video: Denlinger reads Jackson his Miranda rights. Investigator Sarah Lacina is also doing the interview.

Jackson agrees to answer questions. 

Jackson: Says he doesn't work. Went to UI in 2019. Studying business.

Doesn't do any recreational drugs. No medications.

He was home night before. He slept on screened in porch with dog. Went to bed at 11 p.m. Mom, dad and sister were at house.

     

 

 

We are back. Hopefully, we can hear it now. 

5 min. break to fix audio. 

Denlinger: He didn't have a recording device or body cam that day. Officer Tim Brown was there. He asked Brown to stay with them because he had a body cam. 

Jordan Schier is asking judge to play video of interview for jury.  

Denlinger: He meet another investigator at the hospital to talk to Jackson. This was just after 8:30 a.m. Minutes after it happened. He didn't have all the information. Had been told it was a home invasion and Jackson had been shot.

 

Cedar Rapids police investigator Matt Denlinger takes the stand. 

Boesenberg is excused. 

Johnston: You know latent print three doesn't belong to Jackson?

Boesenberg: He can't say that. 

 

Slaughter: If intruder was holding gun, where would you expect to find Jackson's prints?

Boesenberg: Not on the stock end. The barrel end. 

Slaughter: The way the palm prints were on the gun, could it have been held that way to shoot a foot?

Boesenberg: Yes.  

If there was a struggle over gun, the prints would have been smeared or smudged. 

Slaughter: Did you cut up carpet where blood was saturated in Jackson's bedroom?

Boesenberg: He did. No shell casing or bullet was found. 

Boesenberg under redirect: Circular pattern around Jackson's foot gunshot injury appears to be a barrel of the .22 caliber rifle.   

We are back.

Judge calls for 15 min. break. Be back at 2:50 p.m.

Johnston: Did you conduct search for bullet that went through Jackson's foot?

Boesenberg: Yes. They didn't find the bullet.  

Johnston: Did you notice an alarm system in the Jackson house?

Boesenberg: He didn't notice one. 

 

Johnston: Was Sabrina wearing ear plugs that night?

Boesenberg; It was discovered during the autopsy that she was wearing noise cancelling ear buds. 

 

 

Johnston: Photos of Jackson family together all over the house?

Boesenberg: Yes.

 

Johnston: Didn't find any DNA from victims on Jackson?

Boesenberg: Not on the samples we tested. 

Johnston: Jackson didn't have defensive wounds?

Boesenberg: No. 

Johnston: You didn't clean his hands or look at other parts of his body?

Boesenberg: No.

Johnston: Did you see any soot or stipling on foot wound?

Boesenberg: No. 

Johnston: You swabbed Jackson's hand and leg and other parts of body?

Boesenberg: Yes. Swabs were not submitted to DCI for testing. 

Johnston: There is blood on those and it could have indicated victims or intruder? 

Boesenberg: Potentially they could. He doesn't get to make the decisions on those.  

Johnston: Where was third latent print found? 

Boesenberg: On right side of stock.  

Johnston: The way the other palm prints on the gun were positioned, it could be someone having a "tug of war" with gun or pulling it away from someone?

Boesenberg: Yes 

 

  

Johnston: How many potential hits did this print give him?

Boesenberg: He got five names but couldn't confirm any of those. It was low quality, little detail.

Johnston is arguing that he could have done the same thing with this print as he did the others - placing them on gun.

Boesenberg: Agreed.

Johnston: Evidence that someone else was in the house?

Boesenberg: I couldn't say that at all.   

Boesenberg under cross: He doesn't know how many officers went through crime scene before him.

He didn't collect hairs or fibers from scene. 

One of the palm prints wasn't identified. He entered it twice in database. 

Johnston: It could belong to intruder? 

Boesenberg: If intruder existed. He can't say there was an intruder. He doesn't know who it belongs to. 

Johnston: Boesenberg in depo was asked d you have opinion if an intruder was in the house or if it was Jackson who killed his family?

Boesenberg said No in depo.  

We are back. 

Judge is calling for lunch break. Be back at 1:15 p.m. 

Photo of screened in porch where Alex said he was sleeping that morning. Door leads out to backyard.  

Boesenberg: To be stored in the box it has to be taken apart to fit. 

Boesenberg: There was some blood spatter on wall along stairway, on wall by light switch and outside of pool of blood where Jan Jackson's body was found. Also on hallway floor and master bedroom. 

Several firearms were found in this house. In master bedroom - under bed and top of storage area - and safe in basement had numerous guns - possibly around 10.   

The storage box for the Browning was found underneath Alex's bed. 

Boesenberg: No signs of struggle in the house. Furniture appeared to be in normal potions. Pieces of puzzle that was on a coffee table weren't found on the floor.

No blood found going past the backdoor, where Jackson said the intruder fled. 

 

The video shows that the gun is loaded at the stock area. 

Slaughter will play portions of the video.  

Boesenberg: Most firearms are similar to each other. Less than a handful of times he had to div out how to manipulate it. This gun was one of those to div how to load it. Had to view a video to learn the loading process. 

Boesenberg: Photo of three .22 caliber rounds that were left in the rifle. 

He test fired the rifle to collect shell casings and determine how shell casings were ejected. This is a bottom ejecting firearm. He test fired four times.

This is a semi-automatic gun. The trigger can be pulled without cocking it each time to fire. The magazine can hold 11 bullets.

The gun would have had to be reloaded based on gunshot wounds to Jan, Melissa and Sabrina.    

Boesenberg is showing gun to jury. He is demostrating how palm prints were left on gun. On the right and left side - holding gun down with palm prints on each side in same area - below trigger. As if someone was holding it with muzzle pointed down to floor or to feet.  

Boesenberg: Fingerprints are delicate and can be easily smudged or smeared. No prints on rifle were smeared, some were distorted - more heavy oil from skin or maybe someone pressed down too hard - leaving distortion.

 

Boesenberg: Latent print on right side of gun compared to Jackson's right palm and matched. Photos shows correlated ridge areas. He also took this print and overlaid on rifle to show position. 

Those two prints were "good quality" with correlated ridge patterns. 

He found another print on right side but couldn't find a match. It wasn't as good of quality.  

The program spits out potential matches and then investigators have to compare correlated points on a ridge pattern. He couldn't find match on that third ride side print.  

Boesenberg; He then processed the gun for latent prints. They take a known fingerprint and compare to latent prints to see if they have a match. They collected Alex Jackson's prints. 

There were latent prints found on rifle that were compared to Jackson's through use of a computer program. 

Left side of rifle palm latent print matched Jackson's print - photo of correlated ridge detail. He took the print and overlaid it on the gun to get a visual of palm position on the gun.    

Boesenberg: He took some DNA swabs from gun before it was taken from scene and disturbed. He swabbed trigger, grip, area in front of trigger where someone would place their other hand to hold gun and loading area. 

He took additonal swabs when he took gun to the department. 

The results from the swabs were inconclusive or they didn't find any DNA. 

 

We are back. 

Judge calls for break. Be back in 15 min. 

Boesenberg: The rifle found at the Jackson home is the weapon used to fatally shoot the family members. 

Boesenberg is identifying the Browning rifle, which was found in the Jackson home and lying by Jan Jackson's body.   

Photos of Alex's bedroom. His bedroom is next to Sabrina's.

There's a photo of a belt.

Boesenberg: Alex said he used belt in bedroom as tourniquet with a stain.

There's what appears to be blood stains on the carpet by belt. 

 

 

Boesenberg: This rifle ejects casings in downward motion and found close together. Most firearms eject casing to the right or at top. The casings are usually dispersed several feet away from each other. 

Boesenberg: An appointment card for Melissa Jackson regarding hearing aides was found on the floor. 

 

Photos of master bedroom where Melissa was found. She was lying on the floor beside the bed. 

Boesenberg: Spent shell casings found near door way into bedroom.  There is a cell phone on the floor. Two more shell casings. 

Bullet holes in bed pillow and a pillow against headboard. Holes in headboard of bed behind the pillow. Those came from direction of doorway.

Bullets came through drywall of living room that sits behind the bedroom.   

Jury is being shown photos of Sabrina's room, where she was found in her bed.

Boesenberg: They initially found one shell casing. They saw gunshot wound to her left eye. After body was removed, they found another spent casing. He doesn't know how it got there. Possiby could have been in her bedding and when removed, it fell out. 

Sabrina's cell phone was her bed.    

Boesenberg: There was no signs of forced entry at other doors or windows. He saw no signs of forced entry anywhere into this house. 

A photo of .22 caliber Browning rifle was shown to the jury as part of the evidence photos the Boesenberg is identifying.

Bullet hole in the wall by the stairs going from basement to upstairs. They cut a section in drywall to see where bullet flight path. this one was in the flight path coming from the shell casings by the sofa, near Jan Jackson's body. 

The basement door didn't appear to be damaged by someone kicking in door or prying it open. 

Sometimes a latch is broken or not aligned. Framing could also be damaged.  

No signs of forced entry to this door. 

Boesenberg: The shell casings were Remington and .22 caliber. Shell casings and ammo box on the fireplace hearth are also Remington.

There were also some paper towels with black marks on the hearth.

He said typically, a cloth, oil or brush might be used to clean firearms. 

Paper towel could be used but wouldn't be his choice to use. 

 

Jackson told police he and his dad had been cleaning the rifle the night before.   

Boesenberg: Blood stains in the house hallway from his father's body in the basement. The bloody footprints are Alex Jackson's. The prints go both ways in the hall. 

No bloody footprints on main level,where his mother was found, or going into his sister Sabrina's room in the basement.

 

Former CRPD crime scene investigator Brandon Boesenberg continues his testimony. 

It sounds like we might see a demostration of the .22 caliber Browning semi-automatic rifle that police say is the murder weapon. The rifle is unique and an investigator had to look up a video on how to load the gun. It's apparently, not like other rifles.    

Good morning all! The trial will resume in a few minutes. The judge is taking us some matters with the defense and prosecution.