Statewide Iowa — A judge says he will issue a ruling soon on whether the defense attorneys for the man convicted of murdering Mollie Tibbetts should have access to state investigation records in other cases.
The attorneys for Cristhian Bahena Rivera say they learned hours after a jury convicted Bahena that another man was claiming he killed Tibbetts. Attorney Jennifer Frese suggests there may be a link with the case of a missing 11-year-old boy from Montezuma.
Scott Brown, the lead prosecutor on the case, says Bahena’s attorneys are on a fishing expedition.
Brown says he offered to stop the trial in May after learning two people had claimed to have heard another man confess he was the one who killed Tibbetts, but Bahena’s attorneys declined. Brown says the account Bahena’s lawyers presented in court Thursday was confusing.
Bahena was to be sentenced Thursday, but the trial judge granted a delay to consider the request to pursue new leads in the case. Chad Frese, one of Bahena’s attorneys, suggests prosecutors sat on information about a woman who says she was kidnapped in Brooklyn Iowa two months before Tibbetts was abducted.
After Thursday’s hearing, Frese told reporters it’s no coincidence that 11-year-old Xavior Harrelson disappeared near the end of Bahena’s trial.
A hearing is tentatively scheduled for July 27th to consider defense motions for a new trial. Frese says new information indicates two jail inmates and a house in New Sharon that was allegedly used for drug deals and sex trafficking at the time of Tibbetts’ death are connected.
Frese asked the judge to order state officials to give Bahena’s defense team records of several other investigations that could be connected to Tibetts’ disappearance. Prosecutor Scott Brown blasted Frese for revealing details of the state’s on-going investigation of Harrelson’s disappearance in open court.
On May 28th, a jury found Bahena guilty of first degree murder, which carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison.
