CINCINNATI -- The first day of witness testimony in Ray Tensing’s murder trial drew emotional reactions from witnesses, jurors and Tensing himself.
As the courtroom watched the body camera footage of Tensing shooting and killing Sam DuBose, one juror became visibly agitated and needed to look away, and Tensing shifted in his seat and wiped his face. Alicia Napier, who heard the gunshot from her car nearby, began to cry on the stand as she described what she saw.
Thursday’s prosecution witnesses are experts, not people who were present at the scene of the incident, but they still seem likely to turn up the heat on Tensing’s defense team.
Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters said a state video expert will begin Thursday’s session by breaking down the body camera footage frame by frame, and the Cincinnati police officer who interviewed Tensing in the immediate aftermath of DuBose’s death will play a recording of that interview.
Deters said Monday that he believed the tape of that interview would be another decisive ingredient in proving Tensing’s guilt.
"In a lot of these trials, we have to deal with intent of why they did something, and in this case, intent's off the table," Deters said. "Because he said on the tape he intentionally shot him in the head."
Jurors will be able to decide for themselves Thursday whether Deters' interpretation of that interview lines up with their own.
