Former Florida Gator and New England Patriot Aaron Hernandez has been found guilty of first degree murder. The former star tight end had been charged with killing 27-year-old Odin Lloyd on June 17, 2013.
Lloyd, who had been dating Hernandez's fiancee's sister, was shot six times in an industrial park near Hernandez's Massachusetts home.
Hernandez, 25, and two other men were with Lloyd in a rental car on the night of the murder. The men left a bar that night, and Hernandez went back home with the other two men but without Lloyd.
Cops searched Hernandez's home and found forensic evidence that placed a vehicle driven by Hernandez at the scene of the crime. Hernandez also reportedly destroyed a cell phone Massachusetts Police had asked him for.
A rental-car attendant found shell casings in the car. Ballistics determined the casings matched with the victim's wounds.
The defense had tried to pin the murder on Hernandez's two friends, Carlos Ortiz and former Miramar resident Ernest Wallace, and tried to paint Hernandez as a victim of circumstance, caught in an impossible situation.
The prosecution, however, said Hernandez not only planned the murder but tried to cover it up as well.
They said he orchestrated the killing and asked Wallace and Ortiz to help cover it up. Prosecutors said Hernandez fired all six shots into Lloyd.
After several days of deliberations, the jury found Hernandez guilty on all counts, which include unlawful possession of a weapon and ammunition charges.
The first-degree murder conviction carries a mandatory sentence of life in prison without parole.
#AaronHernandez cuffed by court officer after guilty verdict.
#wbz http://t.co/MICnA3egAA pic.twitter.com/M4BatIeyW1
— Peter Wilson (@PetesWire) April 15, 2015Aaron Hernandez appears to mouth the word "wrong" after guilty verdict. https://t.co/ZHECkxZF2V
— Peter Wilson (@PetesWire) April 15, 2015
