REDWOOD CITY, Calif. (KRON) – Dozens of witnesses have testified for the Hillsborough heiress murder trial. Young millionaire Tiffany Li and her boyfriend, Kaveh Bayat, are on trial together facing possible life sentences if the jury returns with guilty verdicts.
Li’s defense team rested its case Monday. Bayat’s team followed suit — without calling for a single witness. Bayat’s defense attorneys appear to be largely relying on Li’s attorneys to prove that neither of them are guilty of committing the ruthless murder plot that was described by prosecutors.
Li’s lawyers have maintained since delivering opening statements that the real killer is the couple’s body guard and close friend: Olivier Adella.
Closing arguments are scheduled for Wednesday morning and are expected to last for at least five hours, and jury deliberations could begin as soon as Thursday.
Closing arguments will likely be less surprising compared to opening statements, when the prosecution’s star witness, Adella, violated his plea deal by contacting a defense witness over Instagram, wound up in handcuffs, and could no longer testify against Li and Bayat.
It’s been more than three years since Keith Green, the father of Li’s young daughters, was killed. Prosecutors said Li lured Green to her Hillsborough mansion on West Santa Inez, Bayat forced a gun into Green’s mouth and pulled the trigger, Li and Bayat drove the body to their body guard’s Burlingame apartment building. The body guard, Adella, later told prosecutors that the couple had paid him thousands of dollars to “take out the trash,” meaning, drive the body north and hide it somewhere that would throw off investigators.
Inside the Redwood City courthouse Tuesday, jurors heard more detailed information about data extracted from multiple “burner phones” that prosecutors allege were used by Bayat and Adella to coordinate the plot to kill Green. Chains of text messages are being used by prosecutors to prove the motive and pinpoint the geographic movements of Green, Li, Bayat, and Adella on April 28, 2016, the night Green vanished in Millbrae.
Li sent text messages to friends claiming that Green was a terrible father to their two daughters. Li and Bayat exchanged many text messages discussing how Green was asking for too much financial support from Li following their messy breakup. Bayat and Green were once friends, but after gaining attention from Li, Bayat demanded that she breakup with Green, according to audio tapes played during the trial. While being questioned by detectives, Bayat claimed that Green had once threatened to kill him.
Li was confronted by detectives early on in their investigation because of geo-tracking from her cellphone and Green’s cellphone, which showed the two devices moving from location to location together. Defense attorneys assert that Green’s phone was actually moving with Adella while Adella was following Li.
READ: Detectives confront Li over gaps in alibi
The last record of Green communicating with anyone was a text message he sent to Li, telling her that he had arrived at the Millbrae Pancake House to talk about their children.