Prosecutor to jurors: 'You will hear a crime scene scream of what happened to Timothy Coggins'
"Griffin, Georgia (CNN)As the trial began Wednesday for one of the men accused of viciously murdering Timothy Coggins in 1983, Coggins' niece said it was a bittersweet day.
"Sweet that we're finally here, 35 years later, but bitter that my grandparents aren't here to see it," Heather Coggins said.
Heather Coggins' grandmother -- Timothy's mom -- died in 2016, but even on her deathbed, Heather previously told CNN, her grandmother "knew that this day would one day come."
Coggins watched as lawyers made opening statements in the trial of Frankie Gebhardt, 60, who is charged with felony murder, aggravated assault and concealing a death in the October 1983 slaying...
Gebhardt's trial is expected to last about a week. Moore's trial could begin later this summer.
Three other people -- one a former corrections officer and another a part-time Milner police officer -- are charged with obstruction for their efforts to derail the investigation after it was reopened in March 2017, Spalding County Sheriff Darrell Dix said when the five were arrested in October.
As with many cold cases, evidence has gone missing, which defense lawyers say will be key to Gebhardt's defense. And while prosecutors acknowledge some witnesses' memories are spotty, the defense team intends to paint them as a rogue's gallery whose credibility is suspect....
The prosecution's case
Chief Assistant District Attorney Marie Broder admitted to the jury there will be problems with the case. In 1983 DNA fingerprinting was not yet an investigative technique and crime scene investigations weren't what they are today.
Plus, she said, the original investigation -- conducted during an era in which residents say the Ku Klux Klan held rallies and parades in Spalding County -- was "horrific, shameful, incomplete" and closed far too quickly, just weeks after the murder. She conceded that half of the evidence from the crime scene is now gone.
Witness testimony and physical and circumstantial evidence, however, will point to Gebhardt, who Broder said repeatedly boasted about killing Coggins -- though never by Coggins' name, only by "the n-word."...
The defense's case
Defense attorney Scott Johnston seized on the emotion Broder invoked, telling jurors that prosecutors want them to decide the case on their feelings rather than facts.
"The state wants you mad. They state wants you angry. The state wants you in a hurry. They want you to rush through," he said, adding that 35 years ago, the state didn't care about Coggins' death. "Just another dead black man in 1983."
The missing evidence will be key to proving Gebhardt's innocence, Johnston said. Included are shell casings, plaster casts of tire impressions, soil samples containing blood, Coggins' blood-stained sweater, hair samples, a homemade club, an empty Jack Daniels bottle and a $1 bill with red stains that was recovered from a store the day after the murder, he said....
Following opening statements, prosecutors called a former GBI medical examiner,...
... Another witness, Jesse Gates, testified that he dropped off Coggins the night of the murder at a black club in Griffin and found it curious there were three white men outside..."
Georgia man goes on trial for racially charged 1983 slaying of Timothy Coggins' - CNN
(From left, Bill Moore Sr. and Frankie Gebhardt have been charged with murder in Coggins' death, while Gregory Huffman, Lamar Bunn and his mother, Sandra Bunn, have been charged with obstruction, police say.)
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