Juror vomited at sight of Jason Corbett’s injuries
A US police officer has described how he told the daughter of Irishman Jason Corbett to close her eyes as he carried her downstairs so she would not see all the blood at the scene of her father’s death, .
Davidson Superior Court also heard that the degree of skull fractures suffered by Mr Corbett was similar to what one would see from a car crash or a fall from a great height.
Cpl Clayton Dagenhardt of the Davidson Sheriff’s Office told the court that Molly Martens and her father, Thomas Martens, who are on trial for the Limerick man’s second-degree murder, had no visible signs of injury the morning that he was bludgeoned to death.
“Nothing remarkable except that she [Ms Martens] had blood on the top of her head,” Cpl Dagenhardt said.
He testified that he saw an emergency paramedic who he knew when he arrived at the scene. The paramedic, who was coming out of the house, told him: “It’s bad. It’s really bad. It’s a horrible scene.”
He testified that he saw Mr Corbett’s body on the floor, face up. He saw blood on his face around his eye and blood on several areas of his body.
Cpl Dagenhardt testified that he and another officer went to collect Mr Corbett’s children, Jack and Sarah, who were asleep upstairs in bed. He said he awoke Sarah and led her backwards down the stairs and told her to keep her eyes closed.
Earlier, a medical examiner told the court Mr Corbett had 10 different impact sites on his head that indicated blunt force trauma.
When he showed the jury a photograph showing the top of Mr Corbett’s head with his scalp peeled off, one of the jurors started gagging, and a bailiff came running with a trash can into which she appeared to vomit. She had to leave the courtroom but was later able to return.
