Jury in Molly Conley murder trial to resume deliberations Monday

EVERETT, Wash. -- The jury reached decisions on all but one count Friday in the murder trial of a Lake Stevens man accused of killing 15-year-old high school student Molly Conley in 2013, authorities said.

After a full day of deliberations, the judge ordered the jury to resume work Monday morning.

The defendant, Erick Nathanial Walker, was charged with one count of murder and four drive-by shooting counts for allegedly firing into houses and at parked vehicles in Lake Stevens and Marysville in the early morning hours of June 2, 2013.

The bullets from the houses and vehicles allegedly matched a gun Walker owned. The bullet that killed Conley was never found.

During the final chapter of the trial, the focus stayed not on  Walker but rather on Conley, the girl who was fatally shot in the neck while walking along South Lake Stevens Road with friends in 2013.

"You heard a little bit about Molly -- who she was, who she wanted to be and those things were taken away," Snohomish County Deputy Prosecutor Ed Stemler said in closing arguments Thursday.

The prosecution said there is not a reasonable doubt Walker is guilty, and that he fired the shot that killed Conley. Stemler argued that all the evidence proves it.

"There is no evidence presented in this trial that anybody had reason to target Molly or these girls," said Stemler. "Somebody just wanted to hurt somebody that night, and it was the defendant."

Stemler went on to argue that the physical evidence is much stronger than the testimony and that it shows Walker had the time to commit the crime.

It was a standing-room-only courtroom, many of the seats filled with Conley`s family, who at times showed emotion.

The defense said they, too, are feeling those emotions, but argued that the state doesn't have enough evidence to link the crime to Walker.

"Based on what they had, they had to make assumptions," said Mark Mestel, Walker's defense attorney.

Assumptions, the defense argued, won`t bring anyone justice if the wrong man is convicted.

"I also think of Erick Walker`s parents," said Mestel. "When there`s not sufficient proof that he did it, then it doesn't make the Conleys any better off."