Defense hammers at investigators over possibility 'serial killer' responsible for 1984 stabbing death

UPDATE: 2:25

The defense grilled investigators about a possible "serial killer" targeting young women during the 1980s, suggesting someone other than accused killer Ryland Shane Absalon stabbed 18-year-old Ginger Hayden in 1984.

Attorney Gary Udashen grilled then-detective Mike Garvin about the killings. Garvin, now an investigator for the district attorney's office, was on the task force asked to look into the killings. Some of those killings remain unsolved, Udashen said.

"You don't know whether there was a serial killer or not, do you?" asked Udashen.

Absalon is standing trial for capital murder in the the death of Hayden, who was stabbed 57 times in her bedroom. He has maintained his innocence, but prosecutors Lisa Callaghan and Jim Hudson say DNA evidence has linked Absalon to the crime scene.

He also confessed to murdering a young woman while undergoing treatment for drug and alcohol abuse in 1986-1987. The defense says he falsely confessed because of the domineering program.

Testimony is continuing in state District Judge Everett Young's case.

-Dianna Hunt

UPDATE: Noon

Jury has taken a lunch break. Back at 1:15 p.m.

UPDATE: 11:55 a.m.

Jurors are passing around the bent steak knife and the blood-soaked socks used in the killing of 18-year-old Ginger Hayden in 1984.

The evidence, submitted under questioning by prosecutor Jim Hudson, was gathered at the crime scene. Jurors also have seen the closet doors behind which accused killer Ryland Shane Abalon reportedly hid before stabbing Hayden to death.

Crime scene investigator Brad Patterson gathered the evidence from the crime scene that day. Under questioning from defense attorney Gary Udashen, Patterson also indicated he was likely involved in gathering evidence in cases of more than a half-dozen deaths of young women that year believed to have been the work of a serial killer.

Udashen suggested to jurors that the serial killer and not Absalon was the real killer in Hayden's death.

Absalon is standing trial for capital murder in state District Judge Everett Young's court. He could face up to life in prison if convicted.

-Dianna Hunt

UPDATE: 10:30 a.m.

Jurors saw graphic crime-scene photos showing the blood-soaked bed of 18-year-old Ginger Hayden, who apparently died in a kneeling position beside her bed. The steak knife used to kill her - bent almost in half by the force of the blows - was near her body.

"There's a lot of blood," then-crime scene investigator Brad Patterson told jurors Tuesday. Patterson has since retired from the Fort Worth police department.

The photos were shown to jurors in the opening day of testimony in the capital murder trial of Ryland Shane Absalon, accused of killing Hayden in 1984.

-Dianna Hunt

Accused killer Ryland Shane Absalon hid in the closet of 18-year-old Ginger Hayden's bedroom until she fell asleep, then he stabbed her repeatedly with a steak knife until she died because she had rebuffed his sexual advances, a prosecutor told jurors Tuesday.

The explosive details about the confessions were disclosed in court during opening statements by prosecutor Lisa Callaghan in Absalon's capital murder trial in the 1984 killing of Hayden.

But defense attorney Gary Udashen told jurors that semen from an unknown male was found on a quilt in Hayden's bedroom, and he suggested the young woman's death may have been linked to a serial killer who was targeting young women in the area in 1984.

Testimony has begun in the trial in state District Judge Everett Young's court.

-Dianna Hunt

Comments

[Pam Williams]

Great job covering the story. Thank you Dianna Hunt

[RhonaJAdamson]

Thank you for covering the story for Ginger Hayden. She has never been and never will be forgotten by me. She was such a sweet heart with a big bright smile. I'm hoping justice will be served.