Defense points to co-defendant
First trial begins in slayings of 2 teens
Attorneys presented conflicting pictures of Connor Kerner during the opening statements of his murder trial Wednesday, portraying a young man who set a trap for two fellow teens over a drug deal before killing them and burning their bodies, or a polite teen who dutifully bought lunch for his mother before driving her to the airport for a business trip the day of the alleged crimes and was being blamed for crimes committed by a codefendant.
Kerner, 19, of the 100 block of
Kinsale, has pleaded not guilty and remains in Porter County Jail without bond, held on two counts of murder and additional felony counts of intimidation, arson, murder in the perpetration of a robbery and attempted robbery.
Kerner was 17 when he allegedly killed Molley Lanham, 19, of St. Jo h n , and Thomas Grill, 18, of Cedar Lake, on Feb. 25, 2019, at his grandparents’ Hebron-area home after a drug deal went bad, then loaded their bodies into the Honda Civic they arrived in and set fire to the vehicle in a wooded area a couple miles away.
Co-defendant John Silva II, of Hamlet, who has pleaded not guilty to two felony counts of murder in the perpetration of a robbery, remains in Porter County Jail without bond. Silva was charged in the killings May 22 and is awaiting the scheduling of a trial date.
Silva, according to charging documents, was in the basement of Kerner’s grandparents’ home at the time of the killings and helped clean up the scene. Silva’s DNA profile was present on a gun allegedly used in the shooting, documents said.
The families of Grill and Lanham, said Chief Deputy Prosecutor Armando Salinas, filed missing person reports with the police departments in their respective communities when the teens disappeared. Both families, Salinas said, were hoping to gain information to ensure that the teens were brought home safely.
“Little did they know that nothing could prepare them for the horror” of their children’s charred bodies being discovered in a car outside of Hebron. “Both were victims of a trap laid by Connor Kerner and John Silva in cover of a drug deal,” Salinas said.
Witnesses would testify that Kerner told them Grill tried to rob him before the murders, Salinas said, adding numerous items, including clothing and a knife with Grill’s blood on it, were found in Kerner’s yard.
Texts between Kerner and his mother, Roxann Kerner, also would come into play, Salinas said, including “how she tells him he needs to come up with a story.”
Indianapolis defense attorney James Voyles, who is representing Kerner with Mark Thiros of Merrillville, pinned the crime on Silva instead.
“You will have to make a decision in t his case whether it’s Mr. Silva who is the killer or Mr. Kerner,” Voyles said.
Defense witnesses, Voyles said, would testify that the recordings made by Silva had been altered in some fashion, and pointed to discrepancies in what Kerner’s now ex-girlfriend would say.
“She spends two days with someone she said burned people and left the in a field,” Voyles said, adding Kerner broke up with her two days later and after that she went to police.
Twelve jurors and two alternates passed muster after jury selection Tuesday, held at the Porter County Expo center to ensure social distancing because of the COVID-19 pandemic. Wednesday, nine jurors spread out in and around the traditional jury box while the remaining five people sat apart from one another in the galley.
Tables for the prosecutor and defense attorneys in Porter Superior Court Judge Roger Bradford’s courtroom were placed at an angle in the courtroom as well. Kerner, dressed in a gray suit, blue shirt and tie, sat with his defense attorneys.
The first witness for the state, Grill’s mother, Patricia Grill, testified she contacted police around 4 p.m. Feb. 26, 2019, to report her son missing. She got Kerner’s phone number from her son’s phone records and called him after she heard her son was headed to meet Kerner when he disappeared.
She told Kerner she understood Lanham and her son were supposed to meet up with him and asked if he knew anything about their whereabouts.
“He stated that they never showed up to meet with him,” and went to Illinois to meet someone else, she said.
She connected with Roxann Kerner on Facebook, and she suggested Patricia Grill have her son’s phone pinged to try to locate him and added she had a background in security and offered to help. She stopped contacting Roxann Kerner when asked by police and others.
She was not aware of Silva being in her son’s phone contacts and had a final phone conversation with Connor Kerner on Feb. 27, 2019.
“The last thing he said to me was, ‘Mrs. Grill, you have a good night.’ I felt at that point the conversation had turned somewhat,” she said.