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STROUDSBURG —The jury found Richard Keiper guilty Monday in Monroe County court of first-degree murder in the October 1968 fatal shooting of Alfred Barnes in Chestnuthill Township.
Barnes, 40, of Bethlehem, was found dead in what’s now the Dave Fleetwood Memorial Park off what’s now Evergreen Hollow Road. This is near Effort, where Keiper was born and lived until age 9 or 10
Barnes’ Ford Thunderbird, which was brand new when he died, was found abandoned on a park trial in Blairstown, N.J., days after his body was discovered.
Keiper, now 69, was finally arrested in September 2013, when he was found living in Boyd, Tex., after confessing his involvement in Barnes’ death. He gave conflicting versions of what happened, saying in both versions that he acted in self-defense when Barnes pulled a gun on him.
The defense in fact moved for a mistrial after the last day of testimony Thursday, saying the prosecution had not fulfilled its promise to call Quaquo Kelly to testify.
As a convicted felon living in Allentown in 1971, Kelly gave police Keiper’s name as a possible suspect, saying Keiper had come to him after Barnes’ death and admitted to shooting a homosexual man in the Poconos and then taking the man’s car. This did not give police enough at the time to arrest Keiper, who could not be found then.
The judge denied the defense’s mistrial motion, saying the prosecution in good faith had expected Kelly to be available to testify and had no idea that unforeseen medical issues would make him unavailable.
According to Keiper, he was walking home from a car show in Allentown, where he was living at the time, when Barnes, a stranger he’s never seen before, drove up to him twice and offered him a ride. Keiper accepted Barnes’ third offer, having no car of his own and thinking it would be nice to ride around in a brand new one, and the two drove around for awhile, eventually arriving at what would become the death scene.
Keiper said Barnes pulled a gun on him and that he grabbed the gun in self-defense when it went off three times during a struggle in the car. Keiper said he then ran about 100 to 150 yards from the car, realized he still had the gun in his hand and then threw it away, though police later found no gun in that area.
Keiper said he walked back to the car, where the wounded Barnes told him not to steal the car.
He said he pulled Barnes out of the car, left Barnes still alive on the ground and took the car, later abandoning it at a Phillipsburg, N.J., truck stop and hitching a ride back to Pennsylvania. Keiper doesn’t know how the car ended up in Blairstown, N.J., where it was later found.
According to Keiper’s second version of events, he and a man named “Steve,” whom he’d just met, were walking from the Allentown car show when Barnes twice offered them both a ride. Both men refused the first two offers and Steve then plotted to accept a ride and steal Barnes’ car if Barnes came back a third time.
Keiper said he reluctantly went along with Steve’s plan when both men accepted Barnes’ third offer.
When they arrived and parked at the scene, Barnes pulled a gun and Keiper grabbed for it when it went off as Steve fled the car. Keiper himself ran from the car, but returned when he heard Steve call him back.
Keiper said he walked back to the car, where the wounded Barnes told him and Steve not to steal the car. He and Steve pulled Barnes out of the car, left him still alive on the ground and took the car.
Keiper said Steve refused his suggestion to call help for the wounded Barnes as they were driving away in the car.
Keiper said he left Steve in Slatington, where Steve claimed to be from, and later abandoned the car in New Jersey. Police said they have found no evidence of Steve’s existence.
In its closing argument to the jury Monday, the defense cited no DNA evidence such as fingerprints, no physical evidence other than the clothes Barnes was wearing when he died and no witnesses other than the now-retired state police investigators assigned to the case at the time. No gun was ever found, the bullets and shell casings found at the scene got lost in police evidentiary custody and Barnes’ car was returned to his family and likely scrapped afterward.
Police found blood stains, a bullet, pieces of the victim’s teeth and a bullet’s dent on the inside of the driver-side door when the car was found abandoned. The defense said this is evidence that all three shots were fired inside the car, which would support Keiper’s self-defense claim.
The defense also questioned the absence of grass stains on Barnes’ pants knees after a forensic pathologist said he was possibly shot execution-style while in a kneeling position, with the shooter standing directly above him, outside the car.
Keiper acted alone, the prosecution said in its closing argument. Though Keiper denied any homosexual activity between him and Barnes, the prosecution said he knew Barnes was trying to pick him up for a homosexual tryst and knew society’s stigma against homosexuals at the time made Barnes a vulnerable robbery target.
Knowing he would likely be arrested and tried for murder, Keiper fabricated “Steve,” giving this fictional character attributes similar to his own, as evidenced by his description of Steve to authorities, the prosecution said. He picked out a location remote enough to have no witnesses and had Barnes drive there, leading Barnes to believe they were going to have sex there.
Keiper said Barnes pulled the gun with his left hand, though Barnes was right-handed, the prosecution pointed out.
Fired inside the car, the first shot entered the right side of Barnes’ nose, went through his tongue and teeth and exited through his chin. Likely the same shot that passed through his right hand when he held that hand up in a protective gesture, that bullet, along with pieces of his teeth, were found in the car.
Contrary to Keiper’s story, this bullet would have left unable to speak and say anything at all, let alone, “Don’t steal my car,” the prosecution said.
Fired outside of the car, the second shot entered Barnes’ right cheek and exited through the right side of his neck. That bullet was later found on the ground by his body.
Likewise fired outside of the car, the last and fatal shot entered the top of Barnes’ head and lodged in the base of his neck, from which it was later extracted during an autopsy. The shell casings from the last two shots were found more than 10 feet from his body.
The prosecution said this evidence contradicts Keiper’s self-defense claim and is more in line with an intentional killing.
It remained to be seen as of early Monday afternoon how long the jury would deliberate before reaching a verdict.