KNOXVILLE, Tenn. — Cold-blooded murder or impetuous suicide.
Those are the choices a Knox County jury has to ponder this week in the trial of 30-year-old John Bassett in the June 2021 killing of his ex-girlfriend Desheena Kyle, 26.
Knox County Assistant District Attorney General Rachel Hill told the panel Tuesday afternoon in her opening statement that Bassett was obsessed with the fact that she might be pregnant. He wanted her dead, so he shot her once in the head at close range, Hill said.
Then, Bassett researched information on his phone about early pregnancies and what happens when someone suffers a gunshot wound to the head. In truth, Kyle was not pregnant, Hill said.
He also spent hours in Kyle's Knoxville apartment, cleaning up blood from various spots in the home and hiding two stained chairs in a location her family would never know. Finally, Hill told jurors, he wrapped her body in tape and garbage bags and hid her in a toolbox in crawlspace under an abandoned house -- his late great-grandmother's old home, in fact.
"He killed her, and he did everything in his power to prevent anyone from knowing what he did to her," Hill declared.
Defense attorneys Cullen Wojcik and Josh Hedrick, however, counter that Kyle was mentally unstable and prone to thoughts of suicide. She took her own life, and it was Bassett's foolish move to try to hide her body and keep that information from her family, Wojcik said.
He made a lot of bad decisions, Wojcik said. He's guilty as charged of tampering with evidence in her death, Hedrick declared. But he didn't commit murder and he didn't abuse her corpse, they said.
Kyle disappeared in June 2021. Her family immediately suspected Bassett, with whom she'd had a stormy, on-and-off relationship.
Police ultimately found her decomposing body in September 2021 in a large toolbox in the vacant home.
Hill and co-counsel Joanie Stewart say technology will play a key role in Bassett's trial.
Authorities found incriminating evidence on his cell phone, including texts, Hill said. And he rented a Ford truck that recorded his movements -- including to the abandoned house -- in an on-board computer, she said.
Technology, Hill said, "was Mr. Bassett's downfall."
Testimony continues Wednesday. Judge Scott Green is presiding over the murder trial, his third in recent weeks.
If jurors find Bassett guilty of murder, the state will seek a separate penalty phase to try to have him put away for life with no chance for parole. Bassett is being held in custody.
