Fourteen years after authorities found Faith Hedgepeth dead, the 19-year-old’s final hours have been unfolding in a North Carolina courtroom, where tearful testimony and questions about missing evidence marked the opening days of a murder trial.Miguel Enrique Salguero-Olivares, 33, is on trial in Durham County Superior Court on charges of first-degree murder, rape, sexual offense and burglary in the 2012 killing of Hedgepeth, a biology major at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill.The trial is in its second week, with Dr.Heather Waleski, a sexual assault nurse examiner with Atrium Health, testifying about forensic medical evidence.The first days of testimony brought tears from witnesses, spectators and jurors, the 9th Street Journal reported.
A forensic technician showed the murder weapon to the jury.Close-up photographs of Hedgepeth’s face and body prompted some court spectators to cover their faces.SLAIN UNC STUDENT’S MOTHER HOPES NEW DOCUMENTARY WILL SHED LIGHT ON UNSOLVED MURDER: ‘I NEED TO KEEP GOING FOR HER’University of North Carolina student Faith Hedgepeth was murdered in 2012.
(Courtesy of Ronald Hedgepeth)The graphic descriptions of internal brain trauma overwhelmed the jury box, prompting the judge to call a recess Friday.Prosecutors and defense attorneys have clashed over whether DNA evidence revealed the killer or an unreliable investigation where key physical evidence vanished.Hedgepeth's roommate, Karena Rosario, now 34, sobbed Wednesday as she recalled finding Hedgepeth nude from the waist down, in their shared bedroom at a nearby off-campus apartment, off Old Chapel Hill Road."I walked around the bed and saw hair.I pulled the comforter down and saw she had a black eye," Rosario said, ABC 11 reported.Rosario took jurors back to Sept.
6, 2012, when she and Hedgepeth studied at a campus library before returning to their apartment to change.The pair then walked to The Thrill nightclub.MURDER SUSPECT ARRESTED 9 YEARS AFTER NORTH CAROLI...