Tucson jury fails to reach verdict in murder case of Isabel Celis, 6

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A judge declared a mistrial Friday afternoon as a jury said it could not reach a verdict in the trial of Christopher M. Clements on a first-degree murder charge in the death of 6-year-old Isabel Celis.

The Pima County jury of eight men and four women, who began deliberating Thursday morning, said they were deadlocked on the first-degree murder charge against Clements, 41.

The judge set a status conference for March 27 to discuss the other charges against Clements in the case, of kidnapping and burglary.

Isabel’s mother, father and brother, who testified at the trial about the morning she went missing from her Tucson bedroom in 2012, were not present in the courtroom when the mistrial was declared at 4:30 p.m. Friday.

Clements showed no reaction.

His defense attorneys had argued to the jury that Sergio Celis, Isabel’s father, was to blame in her death, although he was never charged and testified he had nothing to do with it, and although Clements led authorities to Isabel’s remains in a desert area near Tucson.

Isabel’s disappearance stunned the Tucson community and drew national attention, and her fate was unknown until that day Clements showed investigators where her remains were, five years after she went missing.

Defense attorneys pointed to the lack of physical evidence, with no fingerprints or DNA connecting Clements to Isabel’s disappearance or death.

Prosecutors acknowledged that but called the circumstantial evidence, including Clements’ computer and cell phone records, “overwhelming.”

The trial lasted 10 days and the state called 26 witnesses. The defense called four witnesses; Clements did not take the stand.

Clements, a convicted sex offender, was already found guilty last year by a separate jury in the 2014 killing of 13-year-old Maribel Gonzalez.

Both the Gonzalez and Celis cases went unsolved until 2018 when officials announced Clements’ arrest in the deaths of both Tucson girls.

For his convictions in the Gonzalez case, Clements was sentenced to natural life in prison for first-degree murder and to another 17 years for kidnapping, which will be served consecutively.

The prosecution’s case

Pima County prosecutors say Clements took Isabel from her bedroom in the early morning hours of April 21, 2012. Her father, Sergio Celis, said he went to wake her up at around 8 a.m. and discovered her missing. Isabel’s oldest brother found her window open and the screen bent and propped against the side of the house.

Days turned into weeks, weeks into months and months into years, with the case remaining unsolved. In 2017, FBI agents received a tip that Clements, who was in the Pima County jail on unrelated charges, had information about Isabel’s location. He agreed to lead investigators to Isabel’s body in exchange for the charges being dropped and his car being released from impound.

Clements directed them to a desert area near Avra Valley and Trico roads, pointing investigators to a tree surrounded by dense brush, near which they found a few cranial bones. A wider search of the area revealed several other bones, later identified as belonging to Isabel. Forensic specialists with the Pima County Medical Examiner’s Office testified that one of her vertebra was fractured, likely due to blunt force trauma.

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Law enforcement officers testified that Clements’ electronic devices included a password-protected folder that contained more than 1,300 images of women or girls, many of them wearing little clothing. Some of the images were taken in Tucson and police were able to identify several of the girls. The parents of three testified for the state, saying they didn’t know the photos had been taken and had never met Clements.

Digital forensic examiners found searches in 2014 for “Isabel Celis sexy,” “body found in the desert” and “trace evidence on body” on a computer identified as belonging to Clements.

His phone records revealed several seconds-long calls to the Celis’ landline six months before Isabel’s disappearance. Family members said they did not know him. Isabel’s mother, Becky Celis, testified that she recalled a man with dark hair coming to the house in the months prior to Isabel’s disappearance to ask about an inoperable Acura the family had parked on the side of the house. She told the jury she thought Isabel was standing next to her at the time.

In the early morning hours of Isabel’s disappearance, Clements’ phone pinged off towers in the area of her home. A cell phone data tracking expert outlined for jurors the activity and movements of Clements’ phone the night before and the day of her disappearance. There was no activity on Clements’ phone between 12:45 and 3:45 a.m., despite the fact he told police during an interview that he had gone to pick up a friend around that time, and after calling her a few times with no answer, returned home.

Clements’ phone records show he returned to pick the friend up at around 6 a.m. At 9:20 a.m., when Clements had told police he was sleeping, the phone connected to a cell tower in the area of Interstate 10 and Twin Peaks Road. By 10:13 a.m., Clements’ phone was pinging off cell towers in the Avra Valley area that covered the location where Isabel’s body was eventually found.

Clements’ bank records show he spent $110 at a carwash the next day, which was an anomaly compared to his usual carwash charges of $15 to $25.

Defense blamed the father

Clements’ attorneys, Eric Kessler and Joseph DiRoberto, tried to place the blame for Isabel’s death on her father, saying the family was having financial troubles.

They pointed to Sergio Celis’ calm demeanor when talking to police the morning of Isabel’s disappearance. Sergio testified on the first day of trial that he had worked as an emergency room trauma technician for years and had undergone training about how to handle traumatic situations.

He told the jury he was calm on the phone because, “This is the most important phone call of my life and I need to get the best information out so this can get started.”

Isabel’s parents had testified that her favorite clothes were not in her room after she went missing. Clements’ lawyers suggested to the jury that a stranger wouldn’t know which outfit was her favorite, saying it was hard to believe anyone other than a family member would be able to pick out those specific items. They said there was no evidence presented to show that Sergio Celis didn’t go into his daughter’s room, pack up her things, and walk her out the front door on his own.

Clements lawyers’ noted that the cell tower near Isabel’s house that his phone pinged off of in the early hours of the morning she disappeared has a coverage area of about 150 square miles, which included Clements’ own home.

Kessler said having knowledge of a crime isn’t illegal and that there are “any number of ways he could have known” where the remains were, saying it was up to the state to prove how Clements knew, but they failed to do that.

During closing arguments, Deputy Pima County Attorney Tracy Miller acknowledged the lack of DNA, fingerprints or witnesses to the crime, but called the circumstantial evidence in the case “overwhelming.”

“If you know where a 6-year-old little girl is and that her family has been missing her for five years, why don’t you tell them?” she asked. “Because you’re the murderer, that’s why.”

Photos: Disappearance of Isabel Celis and Maribel Gonzalez