An elderly man was acquitted Friday of murdering a woman with whom he had an on-and-off relationship. Jimmy Jackson, 75, is free, but that leaves the family of Daisy Hayes, 65, voicing anguish. As far as they are concerned, the killer got away.
“All I could do is scream and just run out the courtroom — like what didn’t you see?” Hayes’ daughter Teresa Smith said, according to The Chicago Tribune.
Surveillance footage reportedly showed Jackson dragging a large suitcase out of Hayes’ apartment in 2018. The missing woman was five feet, two inches tall, and she weighed just 85 pounds, her daughter said, according to NBC Chicago.
“You see him struggling with this suitcase,” Smith said. “You see him actually put the suitcase in the dumpster. You actually see him take garbage from other dumpsters to put on top of her so it can be concealed.”
Cook County Judge Diana Kenworthy determined in a bench trial, however, that this was not enough to convict Jackson.
She looked at the suitcase footage and other video showing Jackson coming and going from Hayes apartment with cleaning supplies and wearing different clothes, according to NBC Chicago.
But the judge said that Hayes, who was 65, had been drinking the day she went missing. There was no sign of a struggle at her apartment, or biological evidence of a crime, she said.
Jackson was previously charged with two counts of murder in a 1985 case, according to NBC Chicago. Prosecutors dropped the charges after a witness repeatedly did not show up to court.
[Screenshot via NBC Chicago]