The case of the murder of Mississippi woman Jessica Chambers ended in confusion Monday when the court found jurors deadlocked, forcing a mistrial for suspect Quinton Tellis.
Tellis was arrested for the murder of 19-year-old Chambers, who was found wandering down a road naked and seriously burned on the night of December 6, 2014.
Upon his arrest, Tellis admitted he was with Chambers and had sex with her that night but refused to admit he set her car on fire with her inside, an act that led to her painful death. Authorities found the girl with third-degree burns, her body so badly burned that she could barely utter a sound from her fire-ravaged face.
Ultimately, Tellis was arrested and put on trial for the murder, but this month, a jury of five white people and seven African Americans could not agree on his guilt. Seven voted guilty, and five voted not guilty.
There was confusion, however, when the verdict was originally read, CNN reported.
When the judge asked the jury for its verdict, the jury foreman read a verdict of not guilty. But upon closer examination, the foreman admitted that the verdict was not unanimous, a requirement for their duty. After the revelation, Judge Gerald Chatham was forced to declare a mistrial due to the jury’s botched decision.
During the trial, firefighters testified that it sounded to them like Chambers said a person named “Eric” had set her on fire. But prosecutors said that her face, lips, and throat were so badly burned that anything she may have said could not be trusted.
Prosecutors presented evidence that Tellis had tried to erase all evidence that he had a relationship with the victim. He deleted text messages and destroyed other evidence. The state also showed video evidence that he was driving his sister’s car to the victim’s home and near where the crime occurred that night.
Ultimately, it was not enough to convince all the jurors of the suspect’s guilt.
Prosecutors are mulling a re-trial on the charges.
For now, Tellis will be allowed to walk free, but he still faces charges in the torture death of Meing-Chen Hsiao, a 34-year-old Taiwanese graduate student from the University of Louisiana at Monroe, NBC reported. Tellis was found using the dead woman’s credit cards, police said. No trial has been set for the second case.
Follow Warner Todd Huston on Twitter @warnerthuston.
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