East Bay dismemberment case with jury
An Alameda County jury began deliberating Wednesday the case of a 43-year-old man accused of killing his girlfriend and then dismembering her body last year. The jury must decide whether to convict Joseph Roberts of second-degree murder in the death of 27-year-old Rachel Elizabeth Imani Buckner, whose mutilated body was discovered near an Alameda waterfront trail last July.
If convicted, Roberts could face at least 15 years in state prison.
Jury deliberations began after a monthlong trial that left a central question unanswered: How did Buckner die?
The prosecution said that even without the answer, a mountain of circumstantial evidence confirmed Roberts’ guilt. Roberts’ lawyers said the unanswered question showed the prosecution did not prove Buckner was killed at all, let alone that Roberts killed her.
The case drew widespread attention not only because of the gruesome details but also because of Roberts’ past.
Roberts, a Navy veteran, said he was falsely accused of sexual harassment at Savannah State University in Georgia in 2013, prompting the university to expel him. The Trump administration later pointed to him as a surrogate for men wrongly accused of sexual misconduct as the administration rolled back reforms to Title IX, a law that prohibits sexual discrimination at universities that receive federal funds.
Prosecutors built their case on circumstantial evidence they said showed that Roberts killed Buckner, then sawed off her head, hands and feet to cover his tracks and moved on with his life without concern for his girlfriend, Alameda County Deputy District Attorney Colleen Clark said during her closing arguments.
Clark pointed to what she characterized as a history of domestic violence that Buckner suffered at the hands of Roberts as evidence of his motive to kill her. Buckner had once told police Roberts slapped her across her face.
Roberts’ attorney, Annie Beles, told the jury the prosecution didn’t prove Roberts killed Buckner, calling their case one of “speculation and conjecture.”
The lack of information about how Buckner died before she was dismembered was enough for the
jury to absolve Roberts of murder charges, Beles said.
“What act did Joseph Roberts do” to kill Buckner? “Nothing,” Beles told the jury.
In pushing for an acquittal, Beles attempted to cast doubt on the prosecution’s case. She said Roberts’ DNA wasn’t found on Buckner’s body. She also questioned how someone could dump a body in broad daylight near a populated athletic club without
being seen.
Buckner and Roberts met at San Francisco’s Golden Gate University School of Law in 2019. She was six months pregnant. The pair dated and later moved in together.
Prosecutors allege Roberts killed Buckner in their shared apartment in Pleasanton, then dismembered her body with a jigsaw to conceal her identity before dumping her body near Harbor
Bay Club on July 19, 2023. Her body was in garbage bags wrapped in duct tape.
DNA on some of the garbage bags and a piece of duct tape pointed to Roberts, along with cellphone records that placed him at the scene the day a dog walker came upon Buckner’s body, Clark said. A search of the apartment led investigators to a bone fragment that DNA linked to Buckner.
While Buckner’s death was ruled a homicide, the cause of her death was undetermined. Clark said there was a reason: Any signs of strangulation or injuries to her head were absent because her head was severed, she said.
While Clark acknowledged the lingering questions in the case, she said the circumstantial evidence left no doubt Roberts killed Buckner and tried to cover up the crime when he dismembered her.
“This is a success for which he should not be rewarded,” Clark said.
Roberts didn’t report Buckner missing. Instead he moved on with his life; he even joined a dating app, Clark said.
Roberts did not testify during the trial.