Prosecutors are about to finish presenting their case that three housemates covered up the killing of a friend spending the night at their Dupont Circle town house.
The trial of Joseph Price, 39, Dylan Ward, 40, and Victor Zaborsky, 44, resumes Monday in D.C. Superior Court after a weeklong recess.
The three men are charged with conspiracy, tampering with evidence and obstruction of justice in connection with the Aug. 2, 2006, stabbing death of lawyer Robert Wone.
Prosecutors expect to spend one to two more days calling their final witnesses, Assistant U.S. Attorney Glenn Kirschner said before the break.
Those witnesses include Scott Hixson, a friend and neighbor of the defendants. Hixson is expected to testify about Price’s brother Michael — whom prosecutors have tried to depict as a possible culprit in Wone’s death — and statements the defendants made after the slaying.
Joseph Price told Hixson he “had to pull the knife out of my friend,” according to court documents filed by prosecutors this month.
The knife has played a major role in the prosecution’s case. Over the first three weeks of the trial, prosecutors have sought to prove that the defendants tampered with the crime scene and planted the knife.
A forensic scientist testified that two experiments he conducted suggested that the knife found at scene wasn’t used to stab Wone. Prosecutors say the defendants used a towel to wipe the knife with blood as part of the coverup.
Prosecutors have also spent much time trying to debunk the defense’s theory that an intruder broke into the house and killed Wone.
Police officers and evidence technicians have testified that there was no evidence of a break-in, citing the presence of undisturbed dust and spider webs on the backyard fence and the lack of signs of forced entry and footprints.
In taped police interviews shown in court, all three defendants have maintained the killer must have broken in through an unlocked back door.
After the prosecution rests, defense attorneys will submit a motion for judgment of acquittal. If granted, it would acquit the defendants without requiring the defense to present its case.
The trial is expected to last at least another week.
