March 17, 2025 • 52 mins
As Jason Chen's trial enters its final stretch, the prosecution delivers a major shift, resting their case earlier than expected but before the defense takes over, motions fly, including a request for lesser charges and an attempt to introduce a forensic psychologist to challenge premeditation.
We hear from two critical witnesses:
- Courtney Paglino-Brewer - the downstairs neighbor, who recounts the terrifying scream and chaotic sounds she heard the night Jasmine Pace was murdered.
- Travis Pace, Jasmine’s father, whose desperate search led him to break into Jason Chen’s apartment, discovering Jasmine’s belongings—and a chilling realization that something was terribly wrong.
The defense presents their case, but it’s underwhelming. Their final witness, private investigator Johnny Lawrence, raises doubts about the crime scene but admits he can’t prove anything definitively. After all the motions, legal maneuvering, and cross-examinations, the defense rests—leaving the jury with more questions than answers.
Next, both sides prepare for closing arguments, and the weight of the verdict looms.
Here's the blog for this episode on our website.
On our website, you can see more photos, videos, and blogs about each day of the trial, organized by episode. Go to SequesteredPod.com
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
Before we begin, please beadvised that this episode
contains graphic descriptions ofviolence as presented during the
trial. Please take care whilelistening. It's Saturday,
January 18, 2025 day six of thetrial. By now, we were no longer
(00:22):
the fresh, wide eyed jurors whohad entered the courtroom on day
one. The gravity of this casehad settled in, and with each
passing day, the weight of ourrole grew heavier. We had
listened to hours of testimony,examined evidence, and watched
the state methodically buildtheir case against Jason Chen.
(00:44):
We'd seen Jasmine's family takethe stand. Heard the pain in
their voices as they recountedthe frantic hours they spent
searching for her. We hadlistened to expert witnesses
break down crime scene details,some with precise conclusions,
others with more uncertainty. Wehad watched da Cody WAMP and her
(01:06):
team present their evidence withconfidence, reinforcing over and
over again that this was apremeditated act, not a crime of
passion, not an accident, but amurder, the days of feeling like
outsiders in the courtroom wereover at this point. We weren't
just observing the trial. Wewere part of it. This didn't
(01:30):
feel new anymore. We were hereto finish what we started, and
apparently so was the state i
This is sequestered a juror'sperspective on the murder trial
for Jasmine. Pace, I'm Sarah,juror number 11 each episode,
(01:54):
I'll take you inside thecourtroom, behind the scenes,
and into the weighty moments ofthis trial as we honor Jasmine's
life and navigate thecomplexities of seeking justice.
Let's begin.
This is episode seven, the staterests. You.
(02:23):
Okay. As the courtroom tooktheir seats, Judge Patterson
turned to the prosecution andasked if they had any more
witnesses. Da Cody WAMP stoodand to our surprise, simply
said, the state rests their casejust like that, the prosecution
was done. A brief explanationfollowed from the bench. Now it
(02:48):
was the defense's turn, butbefore we even had a chance to
absorb the shift, we were askedto exit the courtroom. The judge
and attorneys needed to cover afew motions before the defense
could begin, we returned to ourcoffee, card games and books in
the jury room. Meanwhile, in thecourtroom, the defense did
(03:11):
something pretty standard incriminal trials. They filed
what's called a Motion forJudgment of acquittal. This is a
formal request for the judge todismiss some or all of the
charges, arguing that theprosecution didn't present
enough evidence for a reasonablejury to convict. It's a way of
(03:32):
saying, even if you takeeverything the state just
presented at face value, it'sstill not enough to legally
support these charges. Now thismotion is rarely granted in high
profile cases like this,especially in a murder trial,
but it's a critical proceduralstep because it preserves the
defense's ability to appeallater on, if needed. And in this
(03:56):
case, the defense also made aseparate request for the judge
to allow the jury to considerwhat's called lesser included
offenses. Lesser includedoffenses are exactly what they
sound like. They're charges thatare still illegal, but they're
considered less severe versionsof the primary charge. In this
(04:17):
case, the primary charge wasfirst degree murder, which
requires proving premeditation,meaning the killing was planned.
The defense asked the court toalso instruct the jury on lesser
charges like second degreemurder, which doesn't require
premeditation, or voluntarymanslaughter, which could apply
(04:38):
if the killing happened in theheat of the moment. This kind of
legal maneuvering is common, butit's also strategic. It gives
the jury more options. Soinstead of choosing between
convicting on the most seriouscharge or letting the defendant
go free, they could landsomewhere in the middle. It. One
(05:00):
of those moments where you couldfeel both sides preparing for
the end game. The defenseprotecting their client from the
harshest sentence possible, andthe state holding firm that this
was a premeditated, intentionalmurder. The defense had one more
move up their sleeve. Mr. Weissrenewed a motion he'd already
(05:21):
tried once before, he asked thejudge to allow a forensic
psychologist named Dr DouglasLewis to testify for the
defense. Now this wasn't just arandom request, because earlier
in the trial, the state's expertmedical examiner, Dr Steven
Cogswell, actually said that thebest kind of expert to speak to
(05:43):
Jason Chen's state of mind wouldbe a forensic psychologist.
That's exactly who Dr Lewis was,and the defense wanted to bring
him in to testify about Jason'sability or inability to form
premeditation. This isimportant, because premeditation
is what separates first degreemurder from the other lesser
(06:05):
charges I mentioned. If Jasondidn't have the mental capacity
to form premeditation, the jurycould consider a lesser offense
like second degree murder oreven manslaughter for a second
time, Judge Patterson denied therequest, and the reasoning was
layered. First, Judge Pattersonsaid Dr Lewis's opinions were
(06:28):
too speculative, meaning theydidn't meet the legal standard
of certainty needed for experttestimony. Basically, his
opinion didn't cross that linefrom this could be possible to
this is what happened to areasonable degree of
psychological certainty, also,because the defense had waited
(06:49):
until after the trial started toformally request Dr Lewis's
testimony. Judge Patterson ruledit would be unfair to the state
to allow it at this point in thetrial. So the motion was denied
again. The defense took a breakhere to organize their
witnesses, and about 30 minuteslater, we entered the courtroom
(07:12):
and took our seats in the jurybox. The defense calls their
first witness to the stand,Courtney paglino Brewer,
Courtney was the neighbor wholived in apartment 110 the unit
directly below Jason Chen'sapartment. Let's listen in to
defense attorney Weiss askingCourtney about the night Jasmine
(07:33):
pace went missing on the night
of November 22 early hours fromNovember the 23rd in the early
hours from November the 23rd Wasthere an incident that you
forecalled? Uh,
yes, I was woken up in themiddle of the night by a loud
screen.
Can you kind of take us and youcan go slowly through the next
step woke you up, and theneverything that you've heard
(07:56):
from that point until you canhear
there was a screen that startedme out of my sleep. I checked my
phone to see the time, because Iwas going to call 911, it was
around 2am there was a voicethat was screaming words, the
(08:17):
words I couldn't understandfully. Was
it a male voice?
And then assuming that theapartment above mine is laid out
the same as mine, there soundedlike chasing a lot of footsteps
going across towards the frontdoor,
one person's footsteps. Itsounded
like multiple, we said, towardsthe front door. Was towards the
(08:39):
front door, of course,
towards the front office. I wasin the bedroom and I heard it.
You had said that you heard ascream. Can you describe the
story?
Distressed? Not quite, angry,emphatic.
What did you say you could heararguing, an argument or a fight?
(09:04):
I
thought that maybe I had heardthe tail end of the fight. I
only ever heard one
voice after hearing the screamand the arguments and the
footsteps, what did you do? I
lay there awake for a minutebecause I couldn't go back to
sleep. My husband had woken up,but he thought the noise came
(09:28):
from outside, and he went backto sleep rather easily. I could
hear the sounds of TV, and thenwhen I moved from the bedroom to
my living room, there weresounds of someone walking across
the apartment and the sound ofthe washer and the garbage.
(09:52):
You said you could hear thearguing.
I only heard her voice, so Ijust assumed. It was an
argument.
Did you hear any crying?
The voice that came after thescreaming that was it kind of
sounded like when you're alreadyupset, but you're trying to
(10:16):
prove a point and you're cryingat the same time. So it was just
very kind of garbled. I wouldsay that there was crying behind
it.
Did you call that one? I didnot,
because by the time I settleddown from being abruptly woken
up and thought that I heardfootsteps to lacrosse and a door
(10:38):
slam. I thought that it had justa normal apartment argument, and
everything kind of calmed down.
Did you ever contactauthorities? I did. I want
to say the 20/27 or the 28th Whydo you contact because I've seen
(10:59):
the missing persons poster forJasmine on Facebook, and
connected the dots of her lastimmobilization being the floor
above mine. And so I submitted atip to Crime Stoppers, saying
what I heard, and
I just thought was the rightthing to do, and is what you
(11:19):
told Crime Stoppers, then thesame thing they should testify
to a part this morning, yes, sir
Courtney testified that in theearly hours of November 23 the
night Jasmine was murdered, shewas jolted awake by a loud,
panicked scream. It startled herso much, she immediately grabbed
her phone to check the time,thinking she might need to call
(11:42):
911, according to her, it was2:11am, it was the voice that
stuck with her. The Scream sheheard came from a woman, and
after that initial burst ofterror, Courtney could hear her
trying to talk through sobs likeshe was crying and arguing at
the same time, the words weregarbled, and Courtney couldn't
(12:04):
make out exactly what was beingsaid. Then came what she
described as chasing the soundsof two people running from the
floor directly above her towardthe front door of the apartment,
followed by the distinct soundof the front door slamming. 20
minutes later, Courtney heardthe TV in the bedroom turn on
(12:24):
loudly, and about 30 minutesafter that, she hears the
garbage disposal turn on, andthen the washing machine, which
she described, were both runningat the same time. It wasn't
until days later, when Courtneysaw Jasmine's missing person
flyer on Facebook that sherealized what she had actually
heard. According to the flyer,Jasmine's last known location
(12:47):
was at 110 Tremont streetapartment 210 the apartment
directly above hers. That's whenCourtney knew she had to say
something. She immediatelysubmitted a tip to Crime
Stoppers, sharing everything sheremembered from that night. As I
sat there listening to Courtney,my mind couldn't stop racing
with questions, questions, ofcourse, that no one could fully
(13:11):
answer was the TV turned up tocover the sound of something no
one was supposed to hear. Whatwas Jason washing in the middle
of the night? Sheets, clothes,something worse, and the garbage
disposal, what did he put downthere? Was it something small,
or was it evidence of somethingthat could never be recovered?
(13:34):
None of us knew for sure, butwhat haunted me the most was the
realization that Jason wasn'tjust up late tidying his
apartment. He wasn't cleaningthe house. He was covering up a
crime scene right aboveCourtney's head. The next
witness was Jasmine's biologicalfather, Travis pace. Something
(13:59):
to be aware of is that Travisand Jasmine's mom now Katrina
bean, are divorced with Mr.Weiss's leading Travis took us
through the night. Jasmine'sfamily realized she was missing
November 26 into the earlymorning hours of the 27th on the
26th Travis was out to dinnerwith friends celebrating
(14:20):
Thanksgiving when his daughter,Gabby called in a panic, Jasmine
wasn't answering her phone andno one knew where she was.
Travis and his girlfriend droveto the last location. Jasmine's
phone had pinged a building nearTremont street. When they got
there, they found Gabby and someof Jasmine's friends all trying
(14:40):
to figure out how to get inside.They managed to get into the
building through a back door,and started knocking loudly on
every door they could. They weredesperate to make noise, to wake
people up and find someone whohad seen Jasmine, and that's
when they learned about JasonChen. It a neighbor told them
(15:02):
Jason lived on the second floorand that Jasmine had been there
recently. That's all they neededto hear. Travis went straight to
Jason's apartment and knocked.There was no answer. The door
was locked, but Travis managedto force the handle open. What
he found inside made his stomachdrop. The apartment was empty,
(15:22):
but it was clear someone hadleft in a hurry. The bed was
unmade, and there were femaleitems in the bathroom. When
Travis opened a desk drawer,there was Jasmine's driver's
license and credit cards justsitting there in a neat little
stack. That's the moment he knewsomething was terribly wrong.
(15:42):
What did you do in the
bedroom? Whooped. There were nopersons in the bedroom. So now I
turned around with a differentgoal, of not looking for a
person, but to look for evidenceof Jasmine. What did he do to
look for evidence of Jasmine?The doors were the cabinets were
open. Things were on thesurface, and it appeared there
(16:05):
were female products in thebathroom and walking forward and
open the drawer before there wasa computer desk in the top left
of the apartment, if you'refacing into the hallway. So if
you're entering through thedoor, is it to the right, to the
right, immediately, there's acomputer desk. Open the drawer.
(16:31):
Jasmine's driver's license wasright there on the top, stacked
up in a pile, slitted her creditcards, her bank cards, and a
sack of all of Jasmine's cardsand identifications. What did he
do? I took him out of thedrawer, and I spread them apart
widely, distinctly from left toright. They without search
(16:56):
warrant. They could not open adrawer and look for those
themselves. And I tell metelling them that they were
there. It was hearsay, but if Ilay it across the countertop and
they flashed their light on itand recorded it, they can show
that to missing persons, there'ssomething moving it forward. You
(17:19):
do something to help the policeinvestigate. Yes, what did you
do after you laid out the cardscalled 911 I
actually as soon as I opened thedoor and I saw the cards, I
called 911 and told them to call911 this is absolutely the
(17:41):
apartment that Jasmine was in.
Travis immediately stepped outof the apartment and called 911
at this point, Mr. Weiss askedTravis pace if he would
recognize himself on a 911recording. The State objected
wildly, and the jury was askedto leave the courtroom. While we
(18:03):
were out, they played the 911tape for Travis pace, but judge
Patterson ultimately overruledthe option to play it in court,
so we never heard it. All weknow is that Travis told the 911
operator exactly where they wereand that Jasmine had been
missing since Wednesday. Here isTravis pace talking about his
(18:23):
interaction with the officers onscene.
Take a report and submit areport to missing persons. I
said, you get them on the scene.They're on standby. They're not
reporting to the scene. Callthem your detective or your
sergeant, and put pressure ontheir sergeant to make their
(18:44):
sergeant force homicide, forcehomicide, to to to show up. He
said the best I can do would beto tell my sergeant that I think
it's important to put pressureon their sergeant and see what
happens. It's the best I can dofor you. Decide you have to
(19:05):
go back into the apartment.
Yes, we need to go back toimmediately,
continue to look for morethings, anything that would lead
to finding Jasmine. How longwere you any concern?
(19:31):
As soon as the officers left,Travis went back into Jason
Chen's apartment. He spent thenext hour searching, looking for
any clue that might lead him toJasmine sitting in that jury
box. What stood out to me washow clear it was that Travis
wasn't thinking about evidencechain of custody or crime scene
(19:51):
protocols that night, he wasthinking like a dad desperate to
find his daughter and doinganything he could. He. I
couldn't quite figure out thedefense's angle in calling
Travis to the stand. So far,everything he testified to only
seemed to strengthen the caseagainst Jason Chen. Defense
(20:12):
Attorney Weiss takes a sharpturn after this. He focuses on
the small discrepancies betweenTravis paces and Katrina beans
testimony on the night they allwent to the tree man apartments
looking for Jasmine. I'massuming this was to put doubt
in our minds that their storiesdidn't totally line up, but it
seemed like such a small detail.If you remember, on day one of
(20:35):
the trial, Katrina beantestified that they used a
credit card to break into JasonChen's apartment. I remember
thinking, Did it really matterhow they got in? At this point,
both had already admitted tobreaking in. When asked about
the discrepancy, Travis remainedcalm and his response was
simple. We remember itdifferently. You can hear their
(20:57):
exchange here.
You were there with Katrina pacewhen you were interviewed by
Detective Crawford. And I wouldsay you were here in this
courtroom in February of lastyear, and you heard Katrina pace
testified. And then this pastMonday, you were in this room
(21:21):
and you saw Katrina pace testifyon that stand, right, awesome,
or any of those things,
we remember it
differently. It's true.
Who am I to say what the truthis? Did
a residence of the apartmentbuilding opened the door for
(21:42):
you. I support you to come inthe building. Did Katrina pace
or others get into Jason's forcredit cards? I'm not who's the
first person to get into thewar. Did you ever see Katrina
face or another person, use thecredit card again. You said
(22:04):
earlier It'd be impossible touse a red card. You heard
Katrina testify that she wentback in department multiple
times after that one. I heardthat where you worked for those
times. You know, she did anapartment during those times.
(22:26):
Does your ex wife pace? Does shehave a reputation for being on a
scope
the state now has their chanceto cross examine Travis pace,
and it feels like a showdown.
Did you receive a subpoena totestify
in this trial I did by who?
(22:47):
Did you ever receive a subpoenafrom your defense attorney? Were
you ever notified by the defensethat they were going to call you
as a witness today? Did theytell you Monday? Did they tell
you Tuesday? Did they tell youWednesday, Thursday, Friday,
they say this morning, youdidn't know you were being
called as a witness until youwere sitting right there. You
said your name, is that? Right?Yes. How long have you and
(23:11):
Katrina been
divorced? 20 years. Is it fair
to say that y'all don't have agreat relationship? Is it fair
to say that this wholeexperience is important? You're
already tough relationship,sure. Would you say that you're
the one that initially sawJasmine's photo ID, her driver's
(23:32):
license and her credit cards inMr. 10 department? Were they in
the desk drawer, and you tookthem out and put them on the
desk? Is that correct? And youwere knocking on doors because
you couldn't find your daughter,did you? And all you were trying
to do was find your daughter.You
were desperate. You weredesperate. You thought she might
(23:58):
be in Jason's apartment, didn'tyou? I don't
know that part
would you have done anything toget in that apartment because
you had reason to bleed based onwhat the neighbors told you,
that she could have been indanger? Yeah, you have a
military background. Is thatcorrect, sir? Is that one reason
you're proficient in firearms?It is, Did you clean anything up
(24:21):
in Mr. Chin's apartment? No. Didyou plant any evidence in Mr.
Chin's apartment, other than
moving her credit cards,driver's license? You didn't
take anything
in there and leave it. Did youhave any idea at the time what
did happen to your daughter? Didyou have any idea that she had
been stabbed to death at thattime, definitely not. She hadn't
(24:42):
been located, had she but didyou know that he might be
involved? Yes,
well certainly, because he liedabout speaking with her, about
the duration, about the timing,
and you are aware that he liedso. Are you aware how
(25:04):
that's your girlfriend? You'reparticipating with the parents
to look for her. What can I do?I'm equally concerned that she's
missing. How can we find hertogether? The fact that that
wasn't happening was the biggestthe media flag. He's my number
one suspect.
(25:25):
Well, did he tell you that hedid it? But it's because she
came after the wine glasses? No,he lied. When did he say he's
seen her last? He lied aboutthat. Do you recall when he said
he'd seen her last?
I don't remember exactly what hesaid. I just know that it wasn't
what the phone record showed. Itwas different than what we had
(25:45):
proof of.
He was concerned about it was heNo
at all. Was he?
After that frantic night ofsearching, Travis and Jasmine's
family were left with fear andunanswered questions. The next
clue didn't come from theapartment, it came from
(26:06):
Jasmine's own Facebook account.At some point, on Saturday,
November 26 a photo was postedto her Facebook page. It was a
picture of jasmine, butimmediately her family and
friends knew something waswrong.
Were you monitoring Facebookduring this time period? We were
(26:28):
Do you recall a time that weekwhen a photo was posted from
your daughter's Facebookaccount?
It was literally like the matchthat lit this whole thing on
fire because it was not a modestphotograph posted on Facebook.
(26:49):
And anybody that knew Jasmineknew she would not have posted
that, and it was a differenttimeline of her photo, so it
wasn't even recent either. Therewas so many problems with it
that it drew immediate red flagsto everybody in the family and
friends, people that were
(27:10):
what day was that posted? I
believe that was the sameSaturday, the 26th
the 26th and as you know, itwasn't a recent
photo. She has tattoos,
and we can know basically whatand year it is on which tattoos
she has.
(27:30):
Did she have tattoos in thephoto she allegedly posted from
her Facebook the week ofThanksgiving,
they were missing, which meansthat it most definitely was an
earlier photograph.
After some back and forth withthe judge, the Facebook photo
they're talking about wasfinally displayed on the screen
(27:53):
the courtroom was now presentedwith an image of Jasmine
standing in front of a mirrortaking a photo of herself with
her phone. She was wearing blacklace lingerie, and as her father
later described, it was not aphoto Jasmine would have ever
chosen to share publicly. Belowthe image was a caption that
read, enjoying Thanksgiving withmy baby. But Jasmine hadn't been
(28:18):
with anyone for Thanksgiving,and the words didn't sound like
her at all. Then came the mostchilling realization, this
wasn't even a recent photo ofJasmine. Her arms and body were
missing the tattoos her familyand friends knew well, marks
that should have been there ifthis was a recent photo of her,
(28:39):
Jasmine hadn't posted this.Jason had it felt fake, forced,
as if someone was trying to makeit look like she was alive and
well when her family alreadyknew she wasn't. As Travis put
it, this was the match that litthis whole thing on fire. In
(29:00):
other words, this was the momentwhen everything shifted for the
family. Jasmine wasn't justmissing someone. Was actively
manipulating the narrative,rewriting her story in real
time. Is
this a photo that I just
showed you? Yes. It is that yourdaughter.
(29:22):
I She was
does she have tattoos on herarm, on her shoulder in that
photo? Mr. Pace, does that sayenjoying Thanksgiving with my
baby? It does. And you now knowwhen that was posted from
(29:43):
Facebook, she was dead, is thatright? And you now know
that this point in time he hadher phone, didn't he? It.
(30:11):
You know, during sequestration,I had a lot of time to think,
and honestly, I kept wishing Ihad a speaker so that I could
just listen to a great book.That's why I love audiobooks.
Whether I'm driving, walking thedogs or traveling, I can just
press play and get lost in anamazing story anytime and
anywhere. One of my all timefavorites is New York by Edward
(30:35):
Rutherford. This epic historicalnovel spans over 400 years,
following generations offamilies through the city's most
pivotal moments, from its Dutchsettlement days and all the way
to 911 it was one of the firstaudio books I had ever listened
to. It felt like the narratorwas reading the story, just for
(30:56):
me, I was completely hooked.Here's some good news. You can
listen to New York or any otherbook for free. Audible is giving
sequestered listeners a freeaudiobook with a 30 day trial.
Just go to audible trial.com.Forward slash sequestered.
That's one free book yours tokeep forever. So find something
(31:18):
you love and get listening. Goto audible trial.com. Forward
slash sequestered
as we sat there listening toTravis walk through how the
(31:41):
family pieced all of thistogether, how they knew without
a doubt that Jasmine would neverpost something like that. It was
one of the clearest windows wegot into who Jason Chen really
was. This wasn't just abouthiding evidence. This was about
control. Even after Jasmine wasgone, Jason was still trying to
(32:02):
control the narrative andmanipulate how the world saw
her. Once Travis finished histestimony, Judge Patterson let
the jury ask questions. This wasthe part where we could write
down anything we still wanted toknow. The judge and attorneys
would review the questions, andif they were appropriate, he
would ask them directly to thewitness right there in open
(32:25):
court. There was somethingincredibly human about this part
of the process. It wasn'tlawyers trying to make a point,
it was us regular people, a juryof peers, trying to understand
what really happened that nightand trying to make sense of the
choices Travis and the rest ofJasmine's family made in those
(32:45):
Desperate Hours, the firstquestion was simple, how well
did Travis even know Jason? Didhe know they were dating? Had
Jasmine ever mentioned himdirectly? Travis admitted that
Jasmine had never brought Jasonup to him, but she had talked
about him to other people shetrusted, and Travis knew they'd
(33:06):
been close enough to take a tripto Chicago together recently.
How did you know Jason shim isJasmine's boy?
I didn't necessarily know thatit was her boyfriend. I knew
that they had been speaking. Hisname had been spoken about, and
(33:30):
that they knowingly went on atrip to Chicago together, and
that his name was relevant. Weknew they were at least somehow
close enough to take a trip toChicago. More than that, I
wasn't aware how much more theywere dating or not dating, at
(33:55):
least enough to go to Chicago.
Another juror wanted tounderstand exactly how they got
into Jason's apartment. Travisexplained that he forced the
handle, physically, breaking themechanism, to get the door open.
Once inside, he unlocked it sothat they can come in and out
(34:15):
freely. And then came myquestion, the dumpster. Did
anyone in your party check itthat night? And if so, what did
they find? Did
anyone in your party search thedumpster area on the night of
1126, 27 you call it handsomeparticles of clothing or
(34:38):
sanitary pad?
Yes, we did. We we did on thatnight and for the next I'm
sorry to interrupt say you didsearch the dumpster area, or you
did see the clothing secretary,
both. Okay, we did search him.We did see both. You.
(35:00):
Was Katrina pace ever inside theapartment at the same time you
were,
we accepted if she was,
were you present when any itemswere taken from the apartment?
If so, what you recall beingcollected? Were you present when
any items were taken from theapartment?
(35:21):
No, I was not present for that.
Did you take anything before?
No, I did not possibly, and Ireally don't recall possibly we
would have on the very nextentrance, right after the police
(35:42):
had left, and we kind of allconcluded that their help was
going to be less than expedient,and we may have actually grabbed
all of her IDs and stuff at thatexact moment, but it's a blur.
This
(36:02):
wasn't a forensic team withgloves and evidence bags. These
were parents terrified andexhausted looking for anything
that could be a clue. Anotherquestion from the jury to Travis
pace was if he smelled marijuanain Jason Chen's apartment that
night. Travis said that hedidn't smell anything, but he
(36:23):
remembered a bong sitting on thecomputer stand with a baggie
beside it, and even thoughTravis wasn't sure that was
relevant to Jasmine'sdisappearance, he pointed it out
to the police. Anyway, finally,we asked Travis what the bed
looked like when he first walkedin. He said it was messy, unmade
with pillows and blanketsrumpled and some clothing thrown
(36:46):
on top. Nothing dramatic, but itpainted a picture of an
apartment where something hadhappened in a hurry. The next
witness was Johnny Lawrence, aprivate investigator and crime
scene expert from right here inNashville, Tennessee. His
specialty crime scenereconstruction and blood stain
(37:08):
analysis, his job was to examinethe evidence, document it,
analyze it, and piece togetherthe order of events based on
what the scene itself revealed.A little side note here, Johnny
Lawrence was kind of all overthe place. He was presented as
the defense's expert witness,but unlike the state's experts,
(37:31):
his credibility wasn'timmediately accepted. The
prosecution and defense arguedback and forth in front of us
about whether Lawrence'sopinions should even be allowed
as expert testimony. That'sbecause, under Tennessee law,
for someone to testify as anexpert, their opinions have to
substantially assist the jury inunderstanding the evidence. It
(37:54):
took at least 30 minutes forJudge Patterson to decide
whether he could even be enteredas an expert witness. At one
point we were asked to leave theroom while they debated it.
Here's a clip of Weiss arguingfor him to be entered.
Their opinion is this, so that'sthere is flexibility in there.
(38:18):
I'm not asking for it absolutelycertain. I think the flexibility
comes from to the reasonabledegree, but your opinion has to
be something more speculation,just
so the doctor COVID Talk aboutthe position of the body when,
(38:38):
when killed. That is somethingthat the pathetic sort of find
out the doctor Coxwell client onthe crime scene in general, uh,
while he did not testify thatMiss pace was shot for her
handcuff because he's excludedfrom that the state made those
implications that she was misterLawrence can testify regarding
(39:03):
the state of the body, whenfamily can testify regarding
kind of the same things thatdoctor Cox saw. Then there is
investigator Crawford and CSIteam. One of the arguments is,
this is the most blood that theyhave ever seen. Our argument,
our rebuttal is they're notseeing just blood. What we're
(39:23):
seeing is the cleaning materialsthat we talked about then all
these people that havecontaminated the sea. So yes,
the report is probably right. Ihave one on contamination, okay,
but it's not just blood thatwould have been trapped
throughout the apartment. Itwould be in the clean materials
too. And he can opine on that aswell. Then one of the most
serious things, and one of themost important things that we
(39:45):
need mister Lawrence to testifyabout is how the technical is a
part of the crime sceneinvestigation collected
evidence, and more importantly,and what's going to come out
through mister Lawrence orpieces of evidence. He said that
one piece of evidence that. TheCPP still doesn't know that, so
it's important for me to be ableto introduce that through this
(40:07):
witness.
When we returned to thecourtroom, Johnny Lawrence was
still on the stand. JudgePatterson ruled that we would
hear his testimony, but he madeit clear it was just one
expert's opinion, not fact.Lawrence was sworn in, and we
were ready to hear what he hadto say. Unlike the state's
(40:31):
experts, Lawrence wasn'tinvolved from the start. He was
hired by the defense in earlyDecember, 2022 weeks after the
initial investigation, thatmeant he wasn't present for
either of the two searches ofapartment 210 instead, he relied
on reviewing law enforcement'sphotographs and visiting the
(40:52):
scene himself. On December 9, hedescribed walking into the
apartment noting how the mainroom was dark, illuminated by an
eerie blue tinted light. He tookhis own photos, conducted his
own tests, and quickly formedhis opinion this crime scene had
been contaminated. I'm going tobe honest. Lawrence's testimony
(41:17):
was a bit painful to sitthrough. He struggled to clarify
whether his statements wereconclusions, theories or just
opinions. At one point, JudgePatterson had to step in.
Here's what I have. Flesh isout. As far as opinions that
this witness, as an expert,Mike, testify to, I've got his
(41:41):
opinions that nothing can showwhere she died. However, a big
party incident took place in thedesert. As far as the
investigation, more bluestarship has been applied, and
also the scene was contaminatedwith multiple outdoor brought in
and left out. So those are theopinions that I have. As far as
(42:04):
this expert witness, perhapsproviding to the jury, if
there's something I've missed,something you want to explain
more.
One correction on that, sir,Bucha. Not that little Bucha,
but different types oftechniques, and
that's where the differencedespite
(42:28):
the confusion, Mr. Lawrencepressed on. He detailed his
examination of Jason Chen'sapartment, describing blood
stains, transfer stains andimpact stains that suggested
potential contamination. Usingdigital crime scene photos, he
enhanced images to reveal newdetails, including what he
(42:50):
believed to be a blood transferstain on a maroon sheet,
possibly from Jasmine Pace'shand. But discrepancies started
to emerge. Lawrence pointed outdifferences between police body
cam footage and the crime scenephotos later taken, indicating
that items had been moved afterofficers arrived. He also
(43:12):
highlighted the challenges ofinterpreting blood spatter
patterns, noting thatcontamination could have come
from multiple sources. JasonChen law enforcement, or even
the initial investigationitself. To his credit, Lawrence
never claimed to have all theanswers. He didn't say this is
exactly how Jasmine died, andthis is exactly what happened in
(43:36):
apartment 210 in fact, herepeatedly emphasized that he
couldn't reach any absoluteconclusions beyond a reasonable
doubt, which ironically is thestate's job. Judge Patterson
even reminded him of that.Still, while Lawrence couldn't
offer definitive answers, he didform theories educated guesses
(44:00):
based on the patterns and tracesleft behind. One of those
theories, blood wasn't justpresent in one area, it had been
moved, tracked and smearedacross different parts of the
apartment, suggesting that afterJasmine was injured, there was
movement for us as jurors, thisput us in a strange position. On
(44:24):
one hand, we had an experttelling us that gaps existed in
the investigation, that keyevidence may have been missed,
but on the other hand, even headmitted that he couldn't say
with certainty what happened inthat apartment, and that left us
with more questions thananswers. Here's latricia Thomas
(44:44):
from News Channel Nine, sharinga wrap up of day six in the
courtroom.
In images of the day came fromthis a maroon sheet that was
found in Jason Chen's apartment.But. How it was found, and in
what direction and in whatspecific part of the bed remains
(45:07):
to be seen. And that's becausewhat Johnny Lawrence testified
himself about, which is thechanging in the crime scene from
the first time ChattanoogaPolice officers went in with
their body cameras, on whichwould have been November 27 in
the early morning hours afterPace's mother and father called
(45:27):
them there to when those crimescene photos were later taken by
CSI investigators from theChattanooga Police Department.
Now we've seen these imagesbefore in hearings about this
case, let's take a little bit ofa look about what some of them
show. We're not going to showall of them to you. You can see
here in these comparison images,they're pointing out a few
(45:50):
different things. They're sayinga door was closed again. These
were there's a lapse of severaldays in between these two
different items there on thefloor. The blind position is
different. And then, if you cansee in the right hand image,
there's a pair of underwearthat's on the floor that isn't
there in the first image,another thing that the
(46:13):
prosecution brought up on crossexamination of Mr. Lawrence was
the direction and the shape ofthese supposed handprint blood
transfers there, they pointedout, if you look at that first
big spot there that could be afinger, the edge is very
straight. And the prosecutionasked Mr. Lawrence, if you have
(46:38):
a hand print, is the edge of itusually straight. Well, let me
just read you the transcriptionof the testimony there. This is
homicide investigator Paul Moylefrom the prosecutor's office. He
asked Lawrence, isn't itpossible, sir, that what we
actually see on the screen isnot a bloody handprint or bloody
(46:59):
fingerprints, but where thecloth that had been folded over,
and the transfer happened thatway. And then Mr. Lawrence
answers, not necessarily,because you have to understand
what this stain is showing isvariants of the fingers that
have blood on them. And then wedon't know how much blood was on
there, if this was a hand. Soagain, on cross examination, the
(47:24):
prosecution getting Lawrence tosay that he's not sure that it
was a hand either. So a lot ofdoubt about what we were
actually seeing in some of thesephotographs raised, and
something I thought was veryinteresting. Again, we've been
talking in this case about howthe jury is allowed to ask
questions of the witnesses afterthe state and the defense are
(47:47):
done. One and the judge, JudgeBoyd Patterson, has actually
commended the jury on how goodof notes they're taking and how
specific their questions are. Soone juror asks about the items
that are moved in the apartment.Again, these items from Mr.
Lawrence's own report. So thejudge reads the jury question
(48:09):
there at the end. Do you thinkit's possible that Jason Chen
moved items on November 27 afterthe body cam footage was filmed
since cellular records, again,this is from earlier testimony
in the week, show him in thatsame area later in the day. So a
cell phone expert who extractedthe locations of Jason Chen
(48:30):
testified earlier in this weekthat he was in the same location
of Tremont street later on the27th and then this is kind of
where this all comes down thethe expert witness, Mr.
Lawrence, says there's nothingthat gives me any information
about who moves items he'stalking about. There's nothing
to lock in who it was.
(48:58):
Day six of the trial gave usmore than just testimony. It
gave us a timeline ofdesperation. We heard from
Jasmine's father, Travis pace,who physically forced his way
into Jason Chen's apartment,driven not by protocol, but by
panic. He wasn't looking forevidence. He was looking for his
(49:19):
daughter. We heard fromCourtney, the downstairs
neighbor, who unknowingly becamethe ear witness to Jasmine's
final moments, hearing a screamthe chase and sobs that would
later haunt us all. And we heardfrom Johnny Lawrence, a private
investigator who was brought intoo late. His job was to
(49:40):
reconstruct a crime scene thathad already been trampled
through by family, by lawenforcement and by Jason
himself. What Lawrence gave uswasn't certainty. It was a list
of what ifs, and that was thedefense's entire case three
witnesses. None of them did muchto help their argument, and then
(50:03):
just like that, they were done.After all the build up, all the
motions and all the attempts topoke holes in the state's case,
the defense rested with JohnnyLawrence as their final witness.
No bombshell revelations, noairtight alibis, just
speculation discrepancies and aforensic expert who wasn't even
(50:27):
there when the evidence wascollected for a case of this
magnitude, it felt underwhelmingnext time on sequestered you
victims matter. Jasmine pace isnot just some girl listed in
(50:48):
autopsy report. She is not thephotos that you have seen. She's
a person. She had family thatloved her. She was a friend. She
was a granddaughter. Please,don't minimize this trial to the
trial for him,
as the trial nears its end, theprosecution and defense make
(51:12):
their final gripping arguments.Was Jason Chen's crime, a
calculated act of murder or amoment of uncontrolled passion
that's next on episode eight.
(51:33):
Thank you for listening tosequestered a juror's
perspective on the murder trialfor Jasmine pace each episode
brings us closer tounderstanding the trial, the
people involved, and the weightof seeking justice. If this
story speaks to you, pleasefollow, share and continue the
conversation with us. Jasmine'sstory deserves to be remembered.
(51:58):
This is a BP production. Theshow is written, edited and
produced by me Sarah Reed, withCO production by Andrea Kleid.
News clips featured in thisepisode were sourced from wtvc
News Channel Nine, local threenews Chattanooga and the law and
crime network. Music and sounddesign are curated to reflect
(52:19):
the gravity and sensitivity ofthis story, and with the intent
to honor Jasmine, her family andthe community affected by her
death. For more information orto connect with us, visit
sequestered pod.com or follow uson Instagram at sequestered pod.
Thank you for listening untilnext Time, stay curious and stay
(52:41):
safe. You.
Before we begin, please beadvised that this episode
contains graphic descriptions ofviolence as presented during the
trial. Please take care whilelistening. It's Saturday,
January 18, 2025 day six of thetrial. By now, we were no longer
(00:22):
the fresh, wide eyed jurors whohad entered the courtroom on day
one. The gravity of this casehad settled in, and with each
passing day, the weight of ourrole grew heavier. We had
listened to hours of testimony,examined evidence, and watched
the state methodically buildtheir case against Jason Chen.
(00:44):
We'd seen Jasmine's family takethe stand. Heard the pain in
their voices as they recountedthe frantic hours they spent
searching for her. We hadlistened to expert witnesses
break down crime scene details,some with precise conclusions,
others with more uncertainty. Wehad watched da Cody WAMP and her
(01:06):
team present their evidence withconfidence, reinforcing over and
over again that this was apremeditated act, not a crime of
passion, not an accident, but amurder, the days of feeling like
outsiders in the courtroom wereover at this point. We weren't
just observing the trial. Wewere part of it. This didn't
(01:30):
feel new anymore. We were hereto finish what we started, and
apparently so was the state i
This is sequestered a juror'sperspective on the murder trial
for Jasmine. Pace, I'm Sarah,juror number 11 each episode,
(01:54):
I'll take you inside thecourtroom, behind the scenes,
and into the weighty moments ofthis trial as we honor Jasmine's
life and navigate thecomplexities of seeking justice.
Let's begin.
This is episode seven, the staterests. You.
(02:23):
Okay. As the courtroom tooktheir seats, Judge Patterson
turned to the prosecution andasked if they had any more
witnesses. Da Cody WAMP stoodand to our surprise, simply
said, the state rests their casejust like that, the prosecution
was done. A brief explanationfollowed from the bench. Now it
(02:48):
was the defense's turn, butbefore we even had a chance to
absorb the shift, we were askedto exit the courtroom. The judge
and attorneys needed to cover afew motions before the defense
could begin, we returned to ourcoffee, card games and books in
the jury room. Meanwhile, in thecourtroom, the defense did
(03:11):
something pretty standard incriminal trials. They filed
what's called a Motion forJudgment of acquittal. This is a
formal request for the judge todismiss some or all of the
charges, arguing that theprosecution didn't present
enough evidence for a reasonablejury to convict. It's a way of
(03:32):
saying, even if you takeeverything the state just
presented at face value, it'sstill not enough to legally
support these charges. Now thismotion is rarely granted in high
profile cases like this,especially in a murder trial,
but it's a critical proceduralstep because it preserves the
defense's ability to appeallater on, if needed. And in this
(03:56):
case, the defense also made aseparate request for the judge
to allow the jury to considerwhat's called lesser included
offenses. Lesser includedoffenses are exactly what they
sound like. They're charges thatare still illegal, but they're
considered less severe versionsof the primary charge. In this
(04:17):
case, the primary charge wasfirst degree murder, which
requires proving premeditation,meaning the killing was planned.
The defense asked the court toalso instruct the jury on lesser
charges like second degreemurder, which doesn't require
premeditation, or voluntarymanslaughter, which could apply
(04:38):
if the killing happened in theheat of the moment. This kind of
legal maneuvering is common, butit's also strategic. It gives
the jury more options. Soinstead of choosing between
convicting on the most seriouscharge or letting the defendant
go free, they could landsomewhere in the middle. It. One
(05:00):
of those moments where you couldfeel both sides preparing for
the end game. The defenseprotecting their client from the
harshest sentence possible, andthe state holding firm that this
was a premeditated, intentionalmurder. The defense had one more
move up their sleeve. Mr. Weissrenewed a motion he'd already
(05:21):
tried once before, he asked thejudge to allow a forensic
psychologist named Dr DouglasLewis to testify for the
defense. Now this wasn't just arandom request, because earlier
in the trial, the state's expertmedical examiner, Dr Steven
Cogswell, actually said that thebest kind of expert to speak to
(05:43):
Jason Chen's state of mind wouldbe a forensic psychologist.
That's exactly who Dr Lewis was,and the defense wanted to bring
him in to testify about Jason'sability or inability to form
premeditation. This isimportant, because premeditation
is what separates first degreemurder from the other lesser
(06:05):
charges I mentioned. If Jasondidn't have the mental capacity
to form premeditation, the jurycould consider a lesser offense
like second degree murder oreven manslaughter for a second
time, Judge Patterson denied therequest, and the reasoning was
layered. First, Judge Pattersonsaid Dr Lewis's opinions were
(06:28):
too speculative, meaning theydidn't meet the legal standard
of certainty needed for experttestimony. Basically, his
opinion didn't cross that linefrom this could be possible to
this is what happened to areasonable degree of
psychological certainty, also,because the defense had waited
(06:49):
until after the trial started toformally request Dr Lewis's
testimony. Judge Patterson ruledit would be unfair to the state
to allow it at this point in thetrial. So the motion was denied
again. The defense took a breakhere to organize their
witnesses, and about 30 minuteslater, we entered the courtroom
(07:12):
and took our seats in the jurybox. The defense calls their
first witness to the stand,Courtney paglino Brewer,
Courtney was the neighbor wholived in apartment 110 the unit
directly below Jason Chen'sapartment. Let's listen in to
defense attorney Weiss askingCourtney about the night Jasmine
(07:33):
pace went missing on the night
of November 22 early hours fromNovember the 23rd in the early
hours from November the 23rd Wasthere an incident that you
forecalled? Uh,
yes, I was woken up in themiddle of the night by a loud
screen.
Can you kind of take us and youcan go slowly through the next
step woke you up, and theneverything that you've heard
(07:56):
from that point until you canhear
there was a screen that startedme out of my sleep. I checked my
phone to see the time, because Iwas going to call 911, it was
around 2am there was a voicethat was screaming words, the
(08:17):
words I couldn't understandfully. Was
it a male voice?
And then assuming that theapartment above mine is laid out
the same as mine, there soundedlike chasing a lot of footsteps
going across towards the frontdoor,
one person's footsteps. Itsounded
like multiple, we said, towardsthe front door. Was towards the
(08:39):
front door, of course,
towards the front office. I wasin the bedroom and I heard it.
You had said that you heard ascream. Can you describe the
story?
Distressed? Not quite, angry,emphatic.
What did you say you could heararguing, an argument or a fight?
(09:04):
I
thought that maybe I had heardthe tail end of the fight. I
only ever heard one
voice after hearing the screamand the arguments and the
footsteps, what did you do? I
lay there awake for a minutebecause I couldn't go back to
sleep. My husband had woken up,but he thought the noise came
(09:28):
from outside, and he went backto sleep rather easily. I could
hear the sounds of TV, and thenwhen I moved from the bedroom to
my living room, there weresounds of someone walking across
the apartment and the sound ofthe washer and the garbage.
(09:52):
You said you could hear thearguing.
I only heard her voice, so Ijust assumed. It was an
argument.
Did you hear any crying?
The voice that came after thescreaming that was it kind of
sounded like when you're alreadyupset, but you're trying to
(10:16):
prove a point and you're cryingat the same time. So it was just
very kind of garbled. I wouldsay that there was crying behind
it.
Did you call that one? I didnot,
because by the time I settleddown from being abruptly woken
up and thought that I heardfootsteps to lacrosse and a door
(10:38):
slam. I thought that it had justa normal apartment argument, and
everything kind of calmed down.
Did you ever contactauthorities? I did. I want
to say the 20/27 or the 28th Whydo you contact because I've seen
(10:59):
the missing persons poster forJasmine on Facebook, and
connected the dots of her lastimmobilization being the floor
above mine. And so I submitted atip to Crime Stoppers, saying
what I heard, and
I just thought was the rightthing to do, and is what you
(11:19):
told Crime Stoppers, then thesame thing they should testify
to a part this morning, yes, sir
Courtney testified that in theearly hours of November 23 the
night Jasmine was murdered, shewas jolted awake by a loud,
panicked scream. It startled herso much, she immediately grabbed
her phone to check the time,thinking she might need to call
(11:42):
911, according to her, it was2:11am, it was the voice that
stuck with her. The Scream sheheard came from a woman, and
after that initial burst ofterror, Courtney could hear her
trying to talk through sobs likeshe was crying and arguing at
the same time, the words weregarbled, and Courtney couldn't
(12:04):
make out exactly what was beingsaid. Then came what she
described as chasing the soundsof two people running from the
floor directly above her towardthe front door of the apartment,
followed by the distinct soundof the front door slamming. 20
minutes later, Courtney heardthe TV in the bedroom turn on
(12:24):
loudly, and about 30 minutesafter that, she hears the
garbage disposal turn on, andthen the washing machine, which
she described, were both runningat the same time. It wasn't
until days later, when Courtneysaw Jasmine's missing person
flyer on Facebook that sherealized what she had actually
heard. According to the flyer,Jasmine's last known location
(12:47):
was at 110 Tremont streetapartment 210 the apartment
directly above hers. That's whenCourtney knew she had to say
something. She immediatelysubmitted a tip to Crime
Stoppers, sharing everything sheremembered from that night. As I
sat there listening to Courtney,my mind couldn't stop racing
with questions, questions, ofcourse, that no one could fully
(13:11):
answer was the TV turned up tocover the sound of something no
one was supposed to hear. Whatwas Jason washing in the middle
of the night? Sheets, clothes,something worse, and the garbage
disposal, what did he put downthere? Was it something small,
or was it evidence of somethingthat could never be recovered?
(13:34):
None of us knew for sure, butwhat haunted me the most was the
realization that Jason wasn'tjust up late tidying his
apartment. He wasn't cleaningthe house. He was covering up a
crime scene right aboveCourtney's head. The next
witness was Jasmine's biologicalfather, Travis pace. Something
(13:59):
to be aware of is that Travisand Jasmine's mom now Katrina
bean, are divorced with Mr.Weiss's leading Travis took us
through the night. Jasmine'sfamily realized she was missing
November 26 into the earlymorning hours of the 27th on the
26th Travis was out to dinnerwith friends celebrating
(14:20):
Thanksgiving when his daughter,Gabby called in a panic, Jasmine
wasn't answering her phone andno one knew where she was.
Travis and his girlfriend droveto the last location. Jasmine's
phone had pinged a building nearTremont street. When they got
there, they found Gabby and someof Jasmine's friends all trying
(14:40):
to figure out how to get inside.They managed to get into the
building through a back door,and started knocking loudly on
every door they could. They weredesperate to make noise, to wake
people up and find someone whohad seen Jasmine, and that's
when they learned about JasonChen. It a neighbor told them
(15:02):
Jason lived on the second floorand that Jasmine had been there
recently. That's all they neededto hear. Travis went straight to
Jason's apartment and knocked.There was no answer. The door
was locked, but Travis managedto force the handle open. What
he found inside made his stomachdrop. The apartment was empty,
(15:22):
but it was clear someone hadleft in a hurry. The bed was
unmade, and there were femaleitems in the bathroom. When
Travis opened a desk drawer,there was Jasmine's driver's
license and credit cards justsitting there in a neat little
stack. That's the moment he knewsomething was terribly wrong.
(15:42):
What did you do in the
bedroom? Whooped. There were nopersons in the bedroom. So now I
turned around with a differentgoal, of not looking for a
person, but to look for evidenceof Jasmine. What did he do to
look for evidence of Jasmine?The doors were the cabinets were
open. Things were on thesurface, and it appeared there
(16:05):
were female products in thebathroom and walking forward and
open the drawer before there wasa computer desk in the top left
of the apartment, if you'refacing into the hallway. So if
you're entering through thedoor, is it to the right, to the
right, immediately, there's acomputer desk. Open the drawer.
(16:31):
Jasmine's driver's license wasright there on the top, stacked
up in a pile, slitted her creditcards, her bank cards, and a
sack of all of Jasmine's cardsand identifications. What did he
do? I took him out of thedrawer, and I spread them apart
widely, distinctly from left toright. They without search
(16:56):
warrant. They could not open adrawer and look for those
themselves. And I tell metelling them that they were
there. It was hearsay, but if Ilay it across the countertop and
they flashed their light on itand recorded it, they can show
that to missing persons, there'ssomething moving it forward. You
(17:19):
do something to help the policeinvestigate. Yes, what did you
do after you laid out the cardscalled 911 I
actually as soon as I opened thedoor and I saw the cards, I
called 911 and told them to call911 this is absolutely the
(17:41):
apartment that Jasmine was in.
Travis immediately stepped outof the apartment and called 911
at this point, Mr. Weiss askedTravis pace if he would
recognize himself on a 911recording. The State objected
wildly, and the jury was askedto leave the courtroom. While we
(18:03):
were out, they played the 911tape for Travis pace, but judge
Patterson ultimately overruledthe option to play it in court,
so we never heard it. All weknow is that Travis told the 911
operator exactly where they wereand that Jasmine had been
missing since Wednesday. Here isTravis pace talking about his
(18:23):
interaction with the officers onscene.
Take a report and submit areport to missing persons. I
said, you get them on the scene.They're on standby. They're not
reporting to the scene. Callthem your detective or your
sergeant, and put pressure ontheir sergeant to make their
(18:44):
sergeant force homicide, forcehomicide, to to to show up. He
said the best I can do would beto tell my sergeant that I think
it's important to put pressureon their sergeant and see what
happens. It's the best I can dofor you. Decide you have to
(19:05):
go back into the apartment.
Yes, we need to go back toimmediately,
continue to look for morethings, anything that would lead
to finding Jasmine. How longwere you any concern?
(19:31):
As soon as the officers left,Travis went back into Jason
Chen's apartment. He spent thenext hour searching, looking for
any clue that might lead him toJasmine sitting in that jury
box. What stood out to me washow clear it was that Travis
wasn't thinking about evidencechain of custody or crime scene
(19:51):
protocols that night, he wasthinking like a dad desperate to
find his daughter and doinganything he could. He. I
couldn't quite figure out thedefense's angle in calling
Travis to the stand. So far,everything he testified to only
seemed to strengthen the caseagainst Jason Chen. Defense
(20:12):
Attorney Weiss takes a sharpturn after this. He focuses on
the small discrepancies betweenTravis paces and Katrina beans
testimony on the night they allwent to the tree man apartments
looking for Jasmine. I'massuming this was to put doubt
in our minds that their storiesdidn't totally line up, but it
seemed like such a small detail.If you remember, on day one of
(20:35):
the trial, Katrina beantestified that they used a
credit card to break into JasonChen's apartment. I remember
thinking, Did it really matterhow they got in? At this point,
both had already admitted tobreaking in. When asked about
the discrepancy, Travis remainedcalm and his response was
simple. We remember itdifferently. You can hear their
(20:57):
exchange here.
You were there with Katrina pacewhen you were interviewed by
Detective Crawford. And I wouldsay you were here in this
courtroom in February of lastyear, and you heard Katrina pace
testified. And then this pastMonday, you were in this room
(21:21):
and you saw Katrina pace testifyon that stand, right, awesome,
or any of those things,
we remember it
differently. It's true.
Who am I to say what the truthis? Did
a residence of the apartmentbuilding opened the door for
(21:42):
you. I support you to come inthe building. Did Katrina pace
or others get into Jason's forcredit cards? I'm not who's the
first person to get into thewar. Did you ever see Katrina
face or another person, use thecredit card again. You said
(22:04):
earlier It'd be impossible touse a red card. You heard
Katrina testify that she wentback in department multiple
times after that one. I heardthat where you worked for those
times. You know, she did anapartment during those times.
(22:26):
Does your ex wife pace? Does shehave a reputation for being on a
scope
the state now has their chanceto cross examine Travis pace,
and it feels like a showdown.
Did you receive a subpoena totestify
in this trial I did by who?
(22:47):
Did you ever receive a subpoenafrom your defense attorney? Were
you ever notified by the defensethat they were going to call you
as a witness today? Did theytell you Monday? Did they tell
you Tuesday? Did they tell youWednesday, Thursday, Friday,
they say this morning, youdidn't know you were being
called as a witness until youwere sitting right there. You
said your name, is that? Right?Yes. How long have you and
(23:11):
Katrina been
divorced? 20 years. Is it fair
to say that y'all don't have agreat relationship? Is it fair
to say that this wholeexperience is important? You're
already tough relationship,sure. Would you say that you're
the one that initially sawJasmine's photo ID, her driver's
(23:32):
license and her credit cards inMr. 10 department? Were they in
the desk drawer, and you tookthem out and put them on the
desk? Is that correct? And youwere knocking on doors because
you couldn't find your daughter,did you? And all you were trying
to do was find your daughter.You
were desperate. You weredesperate. You thought she might
(23:58):
be in Jason's apartment, didn'tyou? I don't
know that part
would you have done anything toget in that apartment because
you had reason to bleed based onwhat the neighbors told you,
that she could have been indanger? Yeah, you have a
military background. Is thatcorrect, sir? Is that one reason
you're proficient in firearms?It is, Did you clean anything up
(24:21):
in Mr. Chin's apartment? No. Didyou plant any evidence in Mr.
Chin's apartment, other than
moving her credit cards,driver's license? You didn't
take anything
in there and leave it. Did youhave any idea at the time what
did happen to your daughter? Didyou have any idea that she had
been stabbed to death at thattime, definitely not. She hadn't
(24:42):
been located, had she but didyou know that he might be
involved? Yes,
well certainly, because he liedabout speaking with her, about
the duration, about the timing,
and you are aware that he liedso. Are you aware how
(25:04):
that's your girlfriend? You'reparticipating with the parents
to look for her. What can I do?I'm equally concerned that she's
missing. How can we find hertogether? The fact that that
wasn't happening was the biggestthe media flag. He's my number
one suspect.
(25:25):
Well, did he tell you that hedid it? But it's because she
came after the wine glasses? No,he lied. When did he say he's
seen her last? He lied aboutthat. Do you recall when he said
he'd seen her last?
I don't remember exactly what hesaid. I just know that it wasn't
what the phone record showed. Itwas different than what we had
(25:45):
proof of.
He was concerned about it was heNo
at all. Was he?
After that frantic night ofsearching, Travis and Jasmine's
family were left with fear andunanswered questions. The next
clue didn't come from theapartment, it came from
(26:06):
Jasmine's own Facebook account.At some point, on Saturday,
November 26 a photo was postedto her Facebook page. It was a
picture of jasmine, butimmediately her family and
friends knew something waswrong.
Were you monitoring Facebookduring this time period? We were
(26:28):
Do you recall a time that weekwhen a photo was posted from
your daughter's Facebookaccount?
It was literally like the matchthat lit this whole thing on
fire because it was not a modestphotograph posted on Facebook.
(26:49):
And anybody that knew Jasmineknew she would not have posted
that, and it was a differenttimeline of her photo, so it
wasn't even recent either. Therewas so many problems with it
that it drew immediate red flagsto everybody in the family and
friends, people that were
(27:10):
what day was that posted? I
believe that was the sameSaturday, the 26th
the 26th and as you know, itwasn't a recent
photo. She has tattoos,
and we can know basically whatand year it is on which tattoos
she has.
(27:30):
Did she have tattoos in thephoto she allegedly posted from
her Facebook the week ofThanksgiving,
they were missing, which meansthat it most definitely was an
earlier photograph.
After some back and forth withthe judge, the Facebook photo
they're talking about wasfinally displayed on the screen
(27:53):
the courtroom was now presentedwith an image of Jasmine
standing in front of a mirrortaking a photo of herself with
her phone. She was wearing blacklace lingerie, and as her father
later described, it was not aphoto Jasmine would have ever
chosen to share publicly. Belowthe image was a caption that
read, enjoying Thanksgiving withmy baby. But Jasmine hadn't been
(28:18):
with anyone for Thanksgiving,and the words didn't sound like
her at all. Then came the mostchilling realization, this
wasn't even a recent photo ofJasmine. Her arms and body were
missing the tattoos her familyand friends knew well, marks
that should have been there ifthis was a recent photo of her,
(28:39):
Jasmine hadn't posted this.Jason had it felt fake, forced,
as if someone was trying to makeit look like she was alive and
well when her family alreadyknew she wasn't. As Travis put
it, this was the match that litthis whole thing on fire. In
(29:00):
other words, this was the momentwhen everything shifted for the
family. Jasmine wasn't justmissing someone. Was actively
manipulating the narrative,rewriting her story in real
time. Is
this a photo that I just
showed you? Yes. It is that yourdaughter.
(29:22):
I She was
does she have tattoos on herarm, on her shoulder in that
photo? Mr. Pace, does that sayenjoying Thanksgiving with my
baby? It does. And you now knowwhen that was posted from
(29:43):
Facebook, she was dead, is thatright? And you now know
that this point in time he hadher phone, didn't he? It.
(30:11):
You know, during sequestration,I had a lot of time to think,
and honestly, I kept wishing Ihad a speaker so that I could
just listen to a great book.That's why I love audiobooks.
Whether I'm driving, walking thedogs or traveling, I can just
press play and get lost in anamazing story anytime and
anywhere. One of my all timefavorites is New York by Edward
(30:35):
Rutherford. This epic historicalnovel spans over 400 years,
following generations offamilies through the city's most
pivotal moments, from its Dutchsettlement days and all the way
to 911 it was one of the firstaudio books I had ever listened
to. It felt like the narratorwas reading the story, just for
(30:56):
me, I was completely hooked.Here's some good news. You can
listen to New York or any otherbook for free. Audible is giving
sequestered listeners a freeaudiobook with a 30 day trial.
Just go to audible trial.com.Forward slash sequestered.
That's one free book yours tokeep forever. So find something
(31:18):
you love and get listening. Goto audible trial.com. Forward
slash sequestered
as we sat there listening toTravis walk through how the
(31:41):
family pieced all of thistogether, how they knew without
a doubt that Jasmine would neverpost something like that. It was
one of the clearest windows wegot into who Jason Chen really
was. This wasn't just abouthiding evidence. This was about
control. Even after Jasmine wasgone, Jason was still trying to
(32:02):
control the narrative andmanipulate how the world saw
her. Once Travis finished histestimony, Judge Patterson let
the jury ask questions. This wasthe part where we could write
down anything we still wanted toknow. The judge and attorneys
would review the questions, andif they were appropriate, he
would ask them directly to thewitness right there in open
(32:25):
court. There was somethingincredibly human about this part
of the process. It wasn'tlawyers trying to make a point,
it was us regular people, a juryof peers, trying to understand
what really happened that nightand trying to make sense of the
choices Travis and the rest ofJasmine's family made in those
(32:45):
Desperate Hours, the firstquestion was simple, how well
did Travis even know Jason? Didhe know they were dating? Had
Jasmine ever mentioned himdirectly? Travis admitted that
Jasmine had never brought Jasonup to him, but she had talked
about him to other people shetrusted, and Travis knew they'd
(33:06):
been close enough to take a tripto Chicago together recently.
How did you know Jason shim isJasmine's boy?
I didn't necessarily know thatit was her boyfriend. I knew
that they had been speaking. Hisname had been spoken about, and
(33:30):
that they knowingly went on atrip to Chicago together, and
that his name was relevant. Weknew they were at least somehow
close enough to take a trip toChicago. More than that, I
wasn't aware how much more theywere dating or not dating, at
(33:55):
least enough to go to Chicago.
Another juror wanted tounderstand exactly how they got
into Jason's apartment. Travisexplained that he forced the
handle, physically, breaking themechanism, to get the door open.
Once inside, he unlocked it sothat they can come in and out
(34:15):
freely. And then came myquestion, the dumpster. Did
anyone in your party check itthat night? And if so, what did
they find? Did
anyone in your party search thedumpster area on the night of
1126, 27 you call it handsomeparticles of clothing or
(34:38):
sanitary pad?
Yes, we did. We we did on thatnight and for the next I'm
sorry to interrupt say you didsearch the dumpster area, or you
did see the clothing secretary,
both. Okay, we did search him.We did see both. You.
(35:00):
Was Katrina pace ever inside theapartment at the same time you
were,
we accepted if she was,
were you present when any itemswere taken from the apartment?
If so, what you recall beingcollected? Were you present when
any items were taken from theapartment?
(35:21):
No, I was not present for that.
Did you take anything before?
No, I did not possibly, and Ireally don't recall possibly we
would have on the very nextentrance, right after the police
(35:42):
had left, and we kind of allconcluded that their help was
going to be less than expedient,and we may have actually grabbed
all of her IDs and stuff at thatexact moment, but it's a blur.
This
(36:02):
wasn't a forensic team withgloves and evidence bags. These
were parents terrified andexhausted looking for anything
that could be a clue. Anotherquestion from the jury to Travis
pace was if he smelled marijuanain Jason Chen's apartment that
night. Travis said that hedidn't smell anything, but he
(36:23):
remembered a bong sitting on thecomputer stand with a baggie
beside it, and even thoughTravis wasn't sure that was
relevant to Jasmine'sdisappearance, he pointed it out
to the police. Anyway, finally,we asked Travis what the bed
looked like when he first walkedin. He said it was messy, unmade
with pillows and blanketsrumpled and some clothing thrown
(36:46):
on top. Nothing dramatic, but itpainted a picture of an
apartment where something hadhappened in a hurry. The next
witness was Johnny Lawrence, aprivate investigator and crime
scene expert from right here inNashville, Tennessee. His
specialty crime scenereconstruction and blood stain
(37:08):
analysis, his job was to examinethe evidence, document it,
analyze it, and piece togetherthe order of events based on
what the scene itself revealed.A little side note here, Johnny
Lawrence was kind of all overthe place. He was presented as
the defense's expert witness,but unlike the state's experts,
(37:31):
his credibility wasn'timmediately accepted. The
prosecution and defense arguedback and forth in front of us
about whether Lawrence'sopinions should even be allowed
as expert testimony. That'sbecause, under Tennessee law,
for someone to testify as anexpert, their opinions have to
substantially assist the jury inunderstanding the evidence. It
(37:54):
took at least 30 minutes forJudge Patterson to decide
whether he could even be enteredas an expert witness. At one
point we were asked to leave theroom while they debated it.
Here's a clip of Weiss arguingfor him to be entered.
Their opinion is this, so that'sthere is flexibility in there.
(38:18):
I'm not asking for it absolutelycertain. I think the flexibility
comes from to the reasonabledegree, but your opinion has to
be something more speculation,just
so the doctor COVID Talk aboutthe position of the body when,
(38:38):
when killed. That is somethingthat the pathetic sort of find
out the doctor Coxwell client onthe crime scene in general, uh,
while he did not testify thatMiss pace was shot for her
handcuff because he's excludedfrom that the state made those
implications that she was misterLawrence can testify regarding
(39:03):
the state of the body, whenfamily can testify regarding
kind of the same things thatdoctor Cox saw. Then there is
investigator Crawford and CSIteam. One of the arguments is,
this is the most blood that theyhave ever seen. Our argument,
our rebuttal is they're notseeing just blood. What we're
(39:23):
seeing is the cleaning materialsthat we talked about then all
these people that havecontaminated the sea. So yes,
the report is probably right. Ihave one on contamination, okay,
but it's not just blood thatwould have been trapped
throughout the apartment. Itwould be in the clean materials
too. And he can opine on that aswell. Then one of the most
serious things, and one of themost important things that we
(39:45):
need mister Lawrence to testifyabout is how the technical is a
part of the crime sceneinvestigation collected
evidence, and more importantly,and what's going to come out
through mister Lawrence orpieces of evidence. He said that
one piece of evidence that. TheCPP still doesn't know that, so
it's important for me to be ableto introduce that through this
(40:07):
witness.
When we returned to thecourtroom, Johnny Lawrence was
still on the stand. JudgePatterson ruled that we would
hear his testimony, but he madeit clear it was just one
expert's opinion, not fact.Lawrence was sworn in, and we
were ready to hear what he hadto say. Unlike the state's
(40:31):
experts, Lawrence wasn'tinvolved from the start. He was
hired by the defense in earlyDecember, 2022 weeks after the
initial investigation, thatmeant he wasn't present for
either of the two searches ofapartment 210 instead, he relied
on reviewing law enforcement'sphotographs and visiting the
(40:52):
scene himself. On December 9, hedescribed walking into the
apartment noting how the mainroom was dark, illuminated by an
eerie blue tinted light. He tookhis own photos, conducted his
own tests, and quickly formedhis opinion this crime scene had
been contaminated. I'm going tobe honest. Lawrence's testimony
(41:17):
was a bit painful to sitthrough. He struggled to clarify
whether his statements wereconclusions, theories or just
opinions. At one point, JudgePatterson had to step in.
Here's what I have. Flesh isout. As far as opinions that
this witness, as an expert,Mike, testify to, I've got his
(41:41):
opinions that nothing can showwhere she died. However, a big
party incident took place in thedesert. As far as the
investigation, more bluestarship has been applied, and
also the scene was contaminatedwith multiple outdoor brought in
and left out. So those are theopinions that I have. As far as
(42:04):
this expert witness, perhapsproviding to the jury, if
there's something I've missed,something you want to explain
more.
One correction on that, sir,Bucha. Not that little Bucha,
but different types oftechniques, and
that's where the differencedespite
(42:28):
the confusion, Mr. Lawrencepressed on. He detailed his
examination of Jason Chen'sapartment, describing blood
stains, transfer stains andimpact stains that suggested
potential contamination. Usingdigital crime scene photos, he
enhanced images to reveal newdetails, including what he
(42:50):
believed to be a blood transferstain on a maroon sheet,
possibly from Jasmine Pace'shand. But discrepancies started
to emerge. Lawrence pointed outdifferences between police body
cam footage and the crime scenephotos later taken, indicating
that items had been moved afterofficers arrived. He also
(43:12):
highlighted the challenges ofinterpreting blood spatter
patterns, noting thatcontamination could have come
from multiple sources. JasonChen law enforcement, or even
the initial investigationitself. To his credit, Lawrence
never claimed to have all theanswers. He didn't say this is
exactly how Jasmine died, andthis is exactly what happened in
(43:36):
apartment 210 in fact, herepeatedly emphasized that he
couldn't reach any absoluteconclusions beyond a reasonable
doubt, which ironically is thestate's job. Judge Patterson
even reminded him of that.Still, while Lawrence couldn't
offer definitive answers, he didform theories educated guesses
(44:00):
based on the patterns and tracesleft behind. One of those
theories, blood wasn't justpresent in one area, it had been
moved, tracked and smearedacross different parts of the
apartment, suggesting that afterJasmine was injured, there was
movement for us as jurors, thisput us in a strange position. On
(44:24):
one hand, we had an experttelling us that gaps existed in
the investigation, that keyevidence may have been missed,
but on the other hand, even headmitted that he couldn't say
with certainty what happened inthat apartment, and that left us
with more questions thananswers. Here's latricia Thomas
(44:44):
from News Channel Nine, sharinga wrap up of day six in the
courtroom.
In images of the day came fromthis a maroon sheet that was
found in Jason Chen's apartment.But. How it was found, and in
what direction and in whatspecific part of the bed remains
(45:07):
to be seen. And that's becausewhat Johnny Lawrence testified
himself about, which is thechanging in the crime scene from
the first time ChattanoogaPolice officers went in with
their body cameras, on whichwould have been November 27 in
the early morning hours afterPace's mother and father called
(45:27):
them there to when those crimescene photos were later taken by
CSI investigators from theChattanooga Police Department.
Now we've seen these imagesbefore in hearings about this
case, let's take a little bit ofa look about what some of them
show. We're not going to showall of them to you. You can see
here in these comparison images,they're pointing out a few
(45:50):
different things. They're sayinga door was closed again. These
were there's a lapse of severaldays in between these two
different items there on thefloor. The blind position is
different. And then, if you cansee in the right hand image,
there's a pair of underwearthat's on the floor that isn't
there in the first image,another thing that the
(46:13):
prosecution brought up on crossexamination of Mr. Lawrence was
the direction and the shape ofthese supposed handprint blood
transfers there, they pointedout, if you look at that first
big spot there that could be afinger, the edge is very
straight. And the prosecutionasked Mr. Lawrence, if you have
(46:38):
a hand print, is the edge of itusually straight. Well, let me
just read you the transcriptionof the testimony there. This is
homicide investigator Paul Moylefrom the prosecutor's office. He
asked Lawrence, isn't itpossible, sir, that what we
actually see on the screen isnot a bloody handprint or bloody
(46:59):
fingerprints, but where thecloth that had been folded over,
and the transfer happened thatway. And then Mr. Lawrence
answers, not necessarily,because you have to understand
what this stain is showing isvariants of the fingers that
have blood on them. And then wedon't know how much blood was on
there, if this was a hand. Soagain, on cross examination, the
(47:24):
prosecution getting Lawrence tosay that he's not sure that it
was a hand either. So a lot ofdoubt about what we were
actually seeing in some of thesephotographs raised, and
something I thought was veryinteresting. Again, we've been
talking in this case about howthe jury is allowed to ask
questions of the witnesses afterthe state and the defense are
(47:47):
done. One and the judge, JudgeBoyd Patterson, has actually
commended the jury on how goodof notes they're taking and how
specific their questions are. Soone juror asks about the items
that are moved in the apartment.Again, these items from Mr.
Lawrence's own report. So thejudge reads the jury question
(48:09):
there at the end. Do you thinkit's possible that Jason Chen
moved items on November 27 afterthe body cam footage was filmed
since cellular records, again,this is from earlier testimony
in the week, show him in thatsame area later in the day. So a
cell phone expert who extractedthe locations of Jason Chen
(48:30):
testified earlier in this weekthat he was in the same location
of Tremont street later on the27th and then this is kind of
where this all comes down thethe expert witness, Mr.
Lawrence, says there's nothingthat gives me any information
about who moves items he'stalking about. There's nothing
to lock in who it was.
(48:58):
Day six of the trial gave usmore than just testimony. It
gave us a timeline ofdesperation. We heard from
Jasmine's father, Travis pace,who physically forced his way
into Jason Chen's apartment,driven not by protocol, but by
panic. He wasn't looking forevidence. He was looking for his
(49:19):
daughter. We heard fromCourtney, the downstairs
neighbor, who unknowingly becamethe ear witness to Jasmine's
final moments, hearing a screamthe chase and sobs that would
later haunt us all. And we heardfrom Johnny Lawrence, a private
investigator who was brought intoo late. His job was to
(49:40):
reconstruct a crime scene thathad already been trampled
through by family, by lawenforcement and by Jason
himself. What Lawrence gave uswasn't certainty. It was a list
of what ifs, and that was thedefense's entire case three
witnesses. None of them did muchto help their argument, and then
(50:03):
just like that, they were done.After all the build up, all the
motions and all the attempts topoke holes in the state's case,
the defense rested with JohnnyLawrence as their final witness.
No bombshell revelations, noairtight alibis, just
speculation discrepancies and aforensic expert who wasn't even
(50:27):
there when the evidence wascollected for a case of this
magnitude, it felt underwhelmingnext time on sequestered you
victims matter. Jasmine pace isnot just some girl listed in
(50:48):
autopsy report. She is not thephotos that you have seen. She's
a person. She had family thatloved her. She was a friend. She
was a granddaughter. Please,don't minimize this trial to the
trial for him,
as the trial nears its end, theprosecution and defense make
(51:12):
their final gripping arguments.Was Jason Chen's crime, a
calculated act of murder or amoment of uncontrolled passion
that's next on episode eight.
(51:33):
Thank you for listening tosequestered a juror's
perspective on the murder trialfor Jasmine pace each episode
brings us closer tounderstanding the trial, the
people involved, and the weightof seeking justice. If this
story speaks to you, pleasefollow, share and continue the
conversation with us. Jasmine'sstory deserves to be remembered.
(51:58):
This is a BP production. Theshow is written, edited and
produced by me Sarah Reed, withCO production by Andrea Kleid.
News clips featured in thisepisode were sourced from wtvc
News Channel Nine, local threenews Chattanooga and the law and
crime network. Music and sounddesign are curated to reflect
(52:19):
the gravity and sensitivity ofthis story, and with the intent
to honor Jasmine, her family andthe community affected by her
death. For more information orto connect with us, visit
sequestered pod.com or follow uson Instagram at sequestered pod.
Thank you for listening untilnext Time, stay curious and stay
(52:41):
safe. You.
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