The wife of the man accused of killing Grand Junction mother and call girl Paige Birgfeld said she was in another state the week Birgfeld went missing nine years ago, but that she talked to her husband by phone twice a day every day while she was away.
Lester and Elaine Jones traveled together to California on June 22, she said in court. Two days later, Lester Jones returned home to Grand Junction while his wife continued on to Atlanta for a week. That week, Elaine Jones said, she spoke to her husband by phone every morning before he went to work and every evening. When she came back to Grand Junction on June 30, he picked her up from the airport, and the next morning, after Elaine Jones attended church alone, the two of them ran errands.
Elaine Jones said that night July 1 Lester Jones left at about 9 p.m., telling her he thought he had left the lights on at the RV dealer where he worked. He returned about an hour later.
It was during that hour that prosecutors claim Jones drove Birgfelds red Ford Focus to the parking lot of a business near his workplace and set it on fire, using an accelerant.
Elaine Jones told Public Defender Kara Smith Tuesday in court that she didnt smell any gasoline or fumes on her husband when he returned home.
