LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — The jury foreman in the murder trial of Robert Telles was unsure whether to convict the ex-politician until he took the stand and told the panel about a vast conspiracy.
Last Wednesday, the jury convicted Telles for the Sept. 2, 2022, killing of Jeff German, a Las Vegas Review-Journal investigative reporter. The high-profile trial contrasted two conflicting narratives. The defense, headed by attorney Robert Draskovich, focused on potential human error by law enforcement. Telles, who took the stand on his behalf, described a broad conspiracy that saw him as a victim framed for German’s murder. The prosecution emphasized Telles’ motive: anger towards German’s reporting.
“That’s why when I went back there, I was a strong guilty at the beginning,” Gregory Whitney, the jury foreman, told the 8 News Now Investigators on Monday. “I just couldn’t find the piece of evidence that he wanted us to find.”
Finding Telles guilty took Whitney and his 11 counterparts the better part of three days of deliberating.
In an interview from jail Friday, Telles told 8 News Now Investigator Vanessa Murphy that the jury got it wrong.
“I get where he’s coming from,” Whitney said. “He really thought he could prove his innocence. He really wanted to tell his story. He thought he told it well enough.”
Whitney said Telles – who took the stand over three days – undermined his own story.
The more they heard, the less they believed, Whitney said. Even so, the group scoured over more than 400 pieces of evidence and testimony from about 30 witnesses to ensure they got it right.
“We just really wanted to just let everyone know what we really did look over everything from Point A to Point B and we wanted to get him the best shot,” Whitney said. “I personally knew nothing about the guy, so I didn’t have any bias.”
Whitney said after the trial, he went online and saw the comments about the days it took the jury to find Telles guilty. What took so long, he said, was certain jurors needed convicting that enough of the evidence pointed to Telles. The group also disproved Telles’ claims that police and his political enemies, among others, conspired to kill German to get rid of Telles.
Whitney said one juror was initially undecided because she could not believe someone could make “so many little mistakes.”
How and why Telles killed German are questions the jury did not have to answer.
“It sticks with you,” Whitney said about the case. “When I was looking through a lot of those evidence photos, I saw stuff that’ll stay with me because it’s not a normal case. It was really one of those cases where you don’t believe that that could be a real story.”
After handing down their guilty verdict, the jury sentenced Telles to life in prison with the possibility of parole after 20 years. Clark County District Court Judge Michelle Leavitt will sentence Telles on the enhancements regarding his charges – the fact that he used a deadly weapon and that German was older than 60 years old – on Oct. 16.
