The teenager’s nervous voice alerted an Aurora 911 dispatcher to the January 2014 shooting on Charles Street.
Someone had been shot. A black Nissan drove off toward Highland Avenue. The woman on the ground was still breathing, the voice explained with a hint of adrenaline behind it.
The sound of wind blowing through the phone filled several seconds of silence as the emergency call taker worked to dispatch an ambulance and police to the scene. Chatter grew in the background of the call as neighbors gathered nearby, but the moans of a wounded Rachel Taylor stood out in the background.
Jurors listened to the 911 recording on Thursday during the third day of testimony in Christopher Whetstone’s murder trial. Whetstone is accused of fatally wounding 22-year-old Taylor, his ex-girlfriend and mother of the couple’s two children, during a dispute outside his home on the night of Jan. 13, 2014. He has pleaded not guilty. As they did with neighborhood witnesses on Wednesday, prosecutors took jurors back to the scene once more by putting the now-19-year-old caller on the witness stand to describe hearing gunshots while in the garage with his mother and, ultimately, seeing Taylor on a driveway across the street.
The state transitioned its case by following up with testimony from the forensic pathologist who conducted Taylor’s autopsy. Dr. Mitra Kalelkar used photos and a body diagram to illustrate the gunshot wounds and other injuries to Taylor’s body. Kalelkar showed the jury three entrance wounds – two on the abdomen, a third toward Taylor’s backside – all of which caused damaging injuries to internal organs. One shot to the abdomen came from no more than 20 inches away, the doctor explained.
“I saw black powder and soot,” Kalelkar said of what surrounded one abdominal wound. “In this case, it was very close to the skin.”
Kalelkar also highlighted cuts and abrasions to Taylor’s hands. Earlier witnesses described Whetstone and Taylor in a struggle outside his home in which he appeared to be reaching for something, possibly a cell phone, Taylor held in her hands.
Jurors appeared attentive as Kalelkar and Assistant State’s Attorney Alex Bederka discussed the diagram, but at least one juror avoided looking at autopsy photos shown on a large TV monitor in front of the jury box. Whetstone, after a brief discussion between two of his attorneys, stood with them next to the box to see the display of photos, which included an overall view of Taylor’s body.
Whetstone’s positioning – separated from the second row of juror seating by a waist-high partition – concerned a juror enough to send Judge John Barsanti a note stating it was difficult to take notes with Whetstone standing nearby. Barsanti later told the jury Whetstone would be moved to a chair in front of the box for future displays that required him to leave the defense table on the other side of the courtroom.
Testimony continues Friday, with prosecutors estimating their case will run through at least Monday.
Dan Campana is a freelance reporter.
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