A bombshell in the form of a confession was dropped today as the prosecution closed its case in the quadruple murder trial of Leslie Pipersburgh and Patrick Robateau.
The prosecution's last witness was ambassador to Mexico Salvador Figueroa - the man who went to pick up the two fugitives when they were intercepted by Mexican authorities trying to cross into the United States without proper documents. He says that Robateau confessed to him at a Mexico City immigration detention center in July of 2002.
And this morning in the Supreme Court, after a submission last week from the defense to throw out the confession, Justice John Gonzalez allowed the jury to hear it.
Keith Swift was in courtroom number 2 and has the details.
Keith Swift Reporting,
On the stand this morning ambassador Salvador Figueroa gave some of the most compelling evidence heard so far. He described Patrick Robeateau's demeanor at that Mexico immigration-holding cell in July of 2002 as soft spoken, polite, and humble. So the ambassador said one of the first questions he asked Robateau was how could you do something like this?
According to Figueroa, Robateau responded "I don't understand how I did it, things got out of control, it happened so fast, and it wasn't until it was over I realized what we had done." Figueroa also said Robateau was remorseful and said he panicked which is why he fled Belize.
Under cross-section examination, defense counsel Linsbert Willis got Figueroa to admit that yes Robateau never used the word killed. But the damage was done and prosecutor Majorie Moyston rested her case.
The defense will make a no case submission in the morning and the jury returns in the afternoon.
Our gavel-to-gavel coverage of the trial continues tomorrow with the defense's submission and the judge's decision on that.