Forensic pathologist says Tera committed suicide
BBM I knew Serna was speaking about this journalist because he really made a point in the ABQJournal to emphasize the point of the failed multiple times experiment with the gun. That article I posted up thread after the testimony last Wednesday.
By Jeff Proctor / Journal Staff Writer on Tue, Jul 9, 2013
POSTED: 1:06 pm
BERNALILLO—A defense-hired forensic pathologist spent this morning on the witness stand picking apart photographs from Tera Chavez’s death scene and her autopsy report on his way to saying he believes she died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound to the mouth in 2007.
Chavez’s husband, former APD officer Levi Chavez, is on trial for her murder in state District Court.
Prosecutors charged Levi Chavez in an April 2011 indictment with first-degree murder and evidence tampering. They allege that he killed his 26-year-old wife with his APD-issued Glock 9 mm pistol in the couple’s home near Los Lunas on either Oct. 19, 20 or 21, 2007 and tried to make her death look like a suicide.
Dr. Charles Wetli testified this morning that he has twice been hired to determine whether Tera killed herself: once by the city of Albuquerque in a civil wrongful death lawsuit and again by Levi Chavez’s criminal attorney, David Serna.
He did not discuss his fees this morning, and prosecutors didn’t ask on cross-examination how much he’d been paid.
Wetli said from the stand that he would’ve expected to see significant injuries around Tera’s mouth had her husband shoved the pistol in and pulled the trigger, as the state alleges.
Instead, there were only eighth-of-an-inch tears at the corners of Tera’s mouth that would’ve been consistent with injuries sustained as a result of the intra-oral gunshot wound, Wetli testified, pointing to an autopsy report prepared by the New Mexico Office of the Medical Investigator.
Wetli said he believes Tera turned the gun upside down and used her thumb to shoot herself. That matched the opinion of the defense crime scene reconstruction expert, Larry McCann, who testified last week.
He also said on direct examination by Serna that he would’ve expected to see some broken teeth.
Assistant District Attorney Anne Keener pressed Wetli on the matter of Tera’s teeth during cross examination.
She showed him a crime scene photograph that appears to show one of Tera’s lower teeth possibly chipped and asked Wetli whether he thought that’s what the photo shows.
“I can’t really say … It’s possible,” he answered, adding that he would’ve expected to see detailed notes in the autopsy report about any teeth that weren’t damaged by the gunshot itself, which he did not.
Wetli agreed with Keener when she pointed out that he hasn’t gone to Tera’s death scene or personally examined her body.
Her questioning then moved to one of the most contentious matters of the entire trial: whether the Glock’s magazine was disengaged from the butt of the pistol when Valencia County Sheriff’s detectives found the gun lying beside Tera’s body.
Earlier testimony from prosecution that the magazine, which holds bullets for the gun, was disengaged, and that Tera couldn’t have disengaged it after shooting herself because she died instantly.
Keener asked Wetli whether he was aware that McCann attempted to demonstrate in court last week that it’s possible to pull the Glock’s trigger and release the magazine in one motion — an experiment that failed multiple times.
Serna objected to the question, saying it “mischaracterized the evidence,” then state District Judge George P. Eichwald sent the jury out of the room.
With the jury outside the courtroom, Serna said McCann’s demonstration wasn’t meant to be an exact replication of how the defense says Tera killed herself because there was no bullet in the gun at the time he attempted it.
“A newspaper reporter wrote an article saying that’s what I tried to do,” he said. “That’s the product of the imagination of a newspaper reporter … Ms. Keener wasn’t even here (at the time of McCann’s demonstration.) Maybe she picked up a newspaper.”
Senior Trial Attorney Bryan McKay, Keener’s co-counsel, was in court Wednesday at the time of McCann’s demonstration.
He argued today that Keener should be allowed to ask Wetli about it, saying McCann “made it very clear how he could do it in one movement — release the magazine.”
In the end Eichwald allowed Keener to ask the question in front of the jury. Wetli said he was aware of the failed demonstration.
As the trial’s lunch break began around 11:30 a.m. today, I asked Serna whether he was referring to my story on McCann’s demonstration.
He said he was, then added: “Just wanted to make you part of the story, man.”
I asked why he hadn’t asked for a correction on my story, which was published in last Thursday’s Journal, if it contained inaccuracies.
He at first said he didn’t believe a correction was necessary. When pressed on why he made the statement about my “imagination” if the story was correct, he said he would call Journal editors and ask for a correction.
Testimony is expected to continue today at 1:30 p.m. Serna is getting close to wrapping up his defense, which means closing arguments could be as soon as tomorrow.
http://www.abqjournal.com/main/219157/news/forensic-pathologist-says-tera-committed-suicide.html
