BELLEFONTE -- A jury solemnly watched yesterday as photo after photo showed a gruesome crime scene: an apartment in disarray, a body sprawled in a State College kitchen, a blood-soaked textbook.
The first day of the murder trial of Andrew Rogers delved into the details of a February 2006 incident that left Penn State student Youngcheol Park dead in Rogers' kitchen. Rogers, 29, is charged with first- and third-degree murder in connection with Park's beating death -- an incident in which he says he acted in self-defense.
The jury is charged with deciding whether the commonwealth disproves Rogers' story, which he will now tell in his own words.
Deborah Lux, Rogers' defense attorney, said during her opening statement that Rogers will be taking the stand to tell the jury about the struggle that ensued in his home, 224 Nimitz Ave., which resulted in the death of Park, 24, on Feb. 23, 2006.
Police said Rogers and Park were doing cocaine together when the fight broke out. Rogers has said a third man, known only as "Sweet," instigated the fight.
Lux said as recently as last week Rogers had sat down with lead investigator Detective Michael McDannel to look at photos in an attempt to identify "Sweet."
Centre County District Attorney Michael Madeira began his opening statement by recounting Feb. 27, when Uniontown Police Lt. Michael Metros found Rogers standing in the police department parking lot -- four days after Park's death.
"What he heard from the defendant made that day one of the strangest days in his career," Madeira said. Metros was the first witness to testify yesterday, and he read aloud the handwritten statement Rogers made to police in Uniontown after turning himself in.
John Tlumac, a State College police officer who first investigated Rogers' residence after receiving a call from Uniontown, described entering the house as "eerie."
The only lights in the house were a dim glow over the dining room table, and the DVD menu to the movie The Beach continually repeating on the television, he testified. In the middle of the kitchen, they found Park's body and confirmed his identification after calling his cell phone, which began ringing in his pocket, he said.
In the afternoon, Madeira flipped through a slideshow of about 50 crime scene photos taken inside Rogers' apartment, while State College Detective Bill Wagner provided commentary.
Park's body could be seen lying in the kitchen on his back, with his arms and legs sprawled out and a pool of blood around his head.
Pictures showed the still open, "blood-soaked" orbital mechanics textbook Park appeared to be studying in Rogers' home that evening. The walls, curtains, ceiling and refrigerator of the house were smeared with blood as well.
Madeira told jurors that the empty beer can found near Park's body showed Rogers "took some time leaving" the house after taking money from Park's wallet, an assumption that was objected to by the defense.
Madeira also told jurors during the opening statement that Rogers choked Park, resulting in a bruise from "ear to ear," and crushed his skull with a baseball bat -- "all for $250 and a couple baggies of coke."
During Madeira's statement, Rogers looked stoically ahead, occasionally pursing his lips or casting his eyes skyward.
Deirdri Fishel, a State College detective who investigated both Park's and Rogers' residences and oversaw Park's autopsy, described Park's face as being so abnormally crushed that, during the autopsy, pieces of his skull fell out "like a jigsaw puzzle" onto the table.
Lux, a public defender, began her opening statement by talking about Rogers' humble upbringing in Iowa City, during which Rogers' mother, who was in attendance, worked various jobs to put a roof over their heads.
After attending high school in Uniontown where he played sports and earned "above-average" grades, Rogers studied Spanish at Penn State and went abroad to Ecuador, she said.
Lux said Park was "more than an acquaintance but less than a friend" to Rogers, and the two first met each other as poker buddies. She said Rogers had known Park for four or five months, though earlier in the day Madeira said the two had been friends for a year.
Lux said the evening of Park's death, Rogers was outside walking with Park when a dark vehicle approached them on the street and a voice called out, "Yo, Young!"
She said Rogers was introduced to the man in the vehicle as "Sweet," whom Rogers described to State College police as about 5 feet 8 inches tall, stocky, with an olive complexion and brown, neatly groomed hair.
When the three returned to Rogers' apartment, "Sweet" started snooping around and tried to grab a stack of Rogers' cash, Lux said.
Lux said Rogers became uncomfortable and asked Park to come upstairs from the basement to the first floor to do his homework so Rogers could be in the same room with Sweet. After hearing a loud noise behind him, Rogers turned to see Sweet attempting to place a plastic bag over his head, and the fight followed, she said.
At one point during the fight, after striking Park with a Yuengling beer bottle and Sweet with a bat, Rogers thought the fight had ended, Lux said.
"It was like the monster reared its ugly head, and the fight was far from over," said Lux, adding that Park produced a gun, which has never been recovered, from his bag and pointed it at Rogers.
After knocking the gun from Park's hands, the last thing Rogers has said he remembers is fainting once Sweet picked up the gun and pointed it at him. Rogers said he woke up on top of Park's motionless body sometime later. Fishel testified that she found no evidence of gun ownership at Park's apartment.
