Vegas politician found guilty of murdering journalist and sentenced to life imprisonment

A jury on Wednesday found a former Las Vegas-area Democratic politician guilty of murdering an investigative journalist who had written critical articles about him.

Robert Telles, 47, was sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 20 years.

Jurors began deliberating Monday to determine whether they agree with prosecutors' allegations that Telles stabbed veteran investigative journalist Jeff German in September 2022, just months after German wrote critical articles about the Democrat and his workplace conduct, including allegations of an inappropriate romantic relationship with a female colleague.

The jury in Las Vegas deliberated for about four hours on Monday before disbanding for the evening. The panel of seven women and five men deliberated for about six hours on Tuesday after a two-week trial. The lawyers made their closing arguments on Monday morning.

On Monday, they sent a message to the judge asking for more stationery and a court technician to show them how to enlarge a laptop video in the jury room.

Democratic politician from Vegas is baffled when confronted with surprising three-word text message in murder trial

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Prosecutor Christopher Hamner said in his closing argument on Monday that German had not finished his work to expose Telles, which ultimately prompted the politician to eliminate the experienced journalist.

Telles lost his Democratic primary for a second term after German first reported on Telles' conduct as head of an obscure county office that handles unclaimed estates for the Las Vegas Review-Journal in May 2022. He practiced civil law before being elected in 2018, and his law license was suspended following his arrest a few days after German's murder.

“And he did it because Jeff wasn't done writing,” Hamner said. “It's like connecting the dots. He murdered him because Jeff's writing was destroying his career. It was destroying his reputation. It was probably threatening his marriage. It was revealing things that he himself admitted he didn't want the public to know.”

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Defense attorney Robert Draskovich argued that the prosecution's argument did not meet legal standards and reminded the jury of Telles' argument on the witness stand that he was being blamed for fighting corruption in the industry. He maintained his innocence.

“Proof beyond a reasonable doubt is the highest standard in this country,” Draskovich said. “It's not about presumption. It's about a preponderance of the evidence. It's not about clear and convincing evidence. It's about proof and reasonable doubt. This concept was borrowed from Old English common law. Our founding fathers thought it was better to let ten guilty men go free than to wrongfully convict one innocent man.”

According to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists, German was the only journalist killed in the United States in 2022.

A day before German's stabbing, Telles learned that Clark County officials were planning to provide German with the emails and text messages Telles and the woman had exchanged in response to the reporter's public records request. Another story is forthcoming, Hamner said.

German was killed the next day.

According to prosecutors, Telles blamed German for writing stories that destroyed his career, ruined his reputation and jeopardized his marriage.

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German was found slashed and stabbed to death in a side yard in front of his house. In a criminal complaint, Telles is accused of “lying in wait” until German came out.

Telles was arrested a few days later after police released a video showing a person wearing an orange work shirt and a wide-brimmed straw hat, carrying a shoulder bag and walking toward German's home.

Prosecutors said they presented compelling evidence, including DNA believed to be Telles' found under German's fingernails. Also found in Telles' home were cut-up pieces of a straw hat and shoes similar to those worn by the person seen in the video outside German's home.

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 trying to frame Telles left them out of the evidence.

During the trial, the jury learned that Telles had hundreds of photographs of German's home and neighborhood on his cellphone and computer.

Other photos taken from Telles' devices included an image of a single gray athletic shoe with a distinctive black pattern and a shot of Telles' work computer in the office of the Clark County Public Administrator and Guardian showing the results of an Internet search of a password-protected site that requested German's name, home address, vehicle registration and date of birth.

Hamner pointed out to jurors that the photo was taken on August 23, 2022 – less than two weeks before German was found dead in a pool of blood.

Police also released images of a distinctive maroon SUV that a Review-Journal photographer saw washing outside Telles' home several days after the murder. At the wheel was a person wearing an orange outfit and a large straw hat.

Prosecutor Pamela Weckerly presented a timeline and videos of Telles' maroon SUV leaving the neighborhood near his home shortly after 9 a.m. on September 2, 2022, and driving on streets near German's home a short time later.

The driver of the SUV was seen wearing a bright orange outfit that resembled that of a person caught on camera walking toward German's house and disappearing into a side yard.

Telles himself repeatedly referred to this person in the witness stand as the murderer of the Germans.

A surfaced text message – allegedly deleted from his phone but recovered via his wife's Apple Watch – shrouded the mystery surrounding the defendant's alibi, as the message revealed that she asked him where he was at the time of the murder.

Prosecutors told the jury that they believed Telles did not respond because he left his cellphone – and thus the ability to locate him – at home.

About a dozen German family members sat together in silence in the quiet courtroom on Monday.

The prosecution is not demanding the death penalty.

Bradford Betz of Fox News Digital contributed to this report.

Source of the original article: Verdict against Robert Telles: Democratic politician in Las Vegas accused of murdering a journalist found guilty and sentenced to life in prison