Attorney challenges police investigation
The quality of the police investigation into the 2009 strangulation death of Jessika Kalaher in Cedar Park was the focus of the fourth day of testimony Friday in the capital murder trial for Crispin Harmel.
Under cross-examination from defense attorney Scott Magee, Cedar Park police Detective Larry Bond testified that investigators never requested video surveillance from two restaurants near where Harmel said Kalaher had dropped him off after he claims the two had consensual sex.
The detective also said investigators did not request video from the Courtyard Marriott Hotel in Round Rock, where Harmel said he spent the night sleeping in his truck after he left the 27-year-old Kalaher at a shopping center.
“Do you think that’s top-notch detective work?” Magee asked.
“I do not,” Bond said.
But prosecutor Nancy Nemer asked Bond if it was true police did not get the video from the restaurants because they knew exactly where Harmel went after getting dropped off by Kalaher, which was to an Exxon gas station. Bond agreed. Video has been shown in court of Harmel at the Exxon a few minutes after his truck left a Walmart parking lot.
Harmel, 38, has been charged with capital murder in Kalaher’s death and faces up to life in prison if convicted; prosecutors are not seeking the death penalty.
He is being tried for a second time after his first trial in 2014 was declared a mistrial after