Dateline what they saw jarod ingram

A nearly month-long trial in a six-year-old murder case that tore a family apart ended Tuesday when a jury found Jarod Ingram not guilty of all charges in the fatal 2012 stabbing of his ex-wife Ciara Ingram at her Lakebottom-area apartment.

Tears fell on both sides of the courtroom as the verdict was announced – tears of relief from Ingram and his current wife, and tears of frustration from the victim’s mother, Sue Barrett, who flew from Indiana from Columbus to testify, and then made a second trip to be here for the verdict.

She has custody of the couple’s two children, who live in Indiana with her. Prosecutors had alleged Jarod Ingram stabbed their mother the evening of June 2, 2012, as they waited for him outside Apt. 206 at The Village on Cherokee, 3113 Cherokee Ave.

The children

Jarod Ingram had brought them there from his Harris County residence so they could say goodbye to their mother, who in a week was to move home to Indiana. The children usually stayed with their father over the summer, and they were to rejoin their mother in the fall to attend school in Indiana.

At the time their mother was slain, the boy was 8 and the girl was 6. The son, now 13, and the daughter, now 12, both testified during the trial.

They told the court they said goodbye to their mother inside the apartment before their father told them to wait in the car, and they waited for what seemed to them a long time before he came out to drive them to his home.

On June 8, 2012, apartment managers were to conduct a final inspection of Ciara Ingram’s apartment, and found her decomposing body in an upstairs bedroom.

Authorities said she had been stabbed three times in the neck. Bleach had been poured on the body, and a bottle of Clorox lay on the floor nearby. Clorox also had been poured on a sofa downstairs, and on a cloth by the kitchen sink, in which lay a butcher knife with a 7-inch blade. It had Ciara Ingram’s blood on it.

Cleaning products were on the floor by an open kitchen cabinet; furniture in the apartment had been slashed; and the thermostat on the air conditioner had been turned down all the way, causing the unit to freeze and lock up.

Investigators believed the 28-year-old nurse had been dead since the day her ex-husband visited, the last day she used her cell phone.

After finding the body, police rushed to Jarod Ingram’s Harris County home that night to get the two children and bring him in for questioning. They released him after seven hours, then arrested him the following July 1. He was not able to get out on bond until October 2013, and was not indicted for murder until Jan. 24, 2017.

The trial

The trial began May 3. Defense attorney Mike Reynolds and prosecutor Wesley Lambertus gave their closing arguments on May 21.

But then the jury split its deliberations: They weighed the evidence part of that Monday, May 21, and all day the next day, but then took a weeklong break around Memorial Day, returning for about 90 minutes Tuesday before announcing a verdict.

They found him not guilty of malice or deliberate murder, of felony murder for killing someone in the commission of a felony, of aggravated assault and of using a knife to commit a crime.

The evidence was circumstantial, and Reynolds believes a timeline of cell phone calls on June 2, 2012, was crucial to the defense, showing jurors Jarod Ingram didn’t have enough time to have done all that authorities claimed he did – to have stabbed his wife, poured bleach around the apartment and slashed the furniture.

According to the timeline Reynolds compiled, Ciara Ingram tried to call a friend about 6:20 p.m., but the friend didn’t answer. She texted a photo of herself and one of the children to her mother about 6:30 p.m., and then from 6:34 to 6:39 p.m., records showed her taking a call from her brother Jeremy Barrett, though he could not recall that.

Jarod Ingram’s last call from the Lakebottom area was at 6:42 p.m., according to the prosecution’s evidence, and his phone signal hit a tower near the Smith Road exit of I-185 at 7:08 p.m. A police officer driving from the Lakebottom apartment to Jarod Ingram’s April Lane home in Harris County said the trip took 11 minutes.

The Ingrams’ son testified that as he and his sister waited outside the apartment, he heard what sounded like laughter and screams coming from upstairs, and the noise gradually died out. He looked into the apartment only once, saw someone’s shadow and ran back to the car, he said.

The daughter said she twice peered through a mail slot into the apartment. The first time she saw nothing. The second time she saw her father with his shirt off, a white bottle of cleaner nearby, she said. He saw her peeking in and waved for her to go away, she said.

Reynolds in his closing argument told jurors he believed the children were coached to give such testimony, which he said conflicted with their early accounts of what they saw and heard.

“These kids have been through a lot. They’ve lost their mother,” Reynolds said, adding, “They’ve effectively lost their father, too.”

The rift in the family remains.

A family torn

Jarod Ingram said he tried to contact his children after the verdict: “I tried to call and reach them today, and the family wouldn’t let me talk to them.”

Reuniting with them is his immediate goal now, he said: “The major thing that I want is I want to have a relationship with them right now.”

Said Reynolds: “He was under a cloud of suspicion beginning June 8, 2012.... He’s been isolated from his children all this time.”

Jarod Ingram said he was allowed only one supervised visit with his son and daughter after their mother’s body was found. That was on June 11, 2012. He would like to have custody of them, as he had once before, he said.

Reynolds said deciding custody now will likely involve a jurisdictional issue, as the children have been in Indiana for six years.

Ingram was working two jobs before his arrest, and lost both in the 15 months he was jailed. “After getting out of jail, it was impossible to get a job,” he said.

Knowing prospective employers would conduct at least a cursory background check, he informed them he was charged with murder. “I’d get all sorts of reactions,” he said. One business summoned security to have him escorted from the building. Some just never called him back.

He now works in retail, as an assistant manager at a hardware store.

Though he lost touch with his children, he found encouragement elsewhere. In January 2016, he married Katie Ingram, whom he met when they were sophomores at Shaw High School: “We’ve known each other and been friends since high school,” he said.

She stood by him through the ordeal, and never distrusted him, he said: “I couldn’t have done this without her.”

He also got support from Asbury United Methodist Church, which he attended before moving to Katie Ingram’s church, Pierce Chapel United Methodist, and from the Sisters of Mercy, to whom he became connected through his mother Pat Ingram’s work with the Chaplain Services Department of St. Francis Hospital.

He initially was unsure how the congregations would react to the charges he faced: “I was anxious about negative reaction.” But the church groups welcomed and supported him, even helping him dig through the evidence before his trial. Supporters regularly attended court.

“I’ve been able to find fulfillment where I can,” he said.

This story was originally published May 29, 2018 2:22 PM.