West found guilty of Chelsey Acorn’s first-degree murder
Posted January 21, 2013 12:54 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
CHILLIWACK (NEWS1130) – The man accused of killing an Abbotsford teenaged girl with the help of his son has been found guilty of first-degree murder.
Jesse West, 60, and his son Dustin Moir were charged after the body of 14-year-old Chelsea Acorn was found near Hope in 2006. Moir has already been convicted in the case.
West’s defence had been that his son was the one who killed Acorn and that he simply buried the body in June of 2005.
Acorn’s cousin Stacey says their family is happy West will be off the street. “You dream about it, you think about it and you feel it in your heart that that’s what it’s going to be. Until you actually hear you still have that little bit doubt that maybe something would go the other way, but it didn’t.”
The judge essentially called West’s account an inventive narrative, saying none of his details fit with the evidence supplied by other witnesses or the gathered by the undercover investigation.
In November of 2005, West bought a shovel, which could have been used to bury the body, which supported the premeditated aspect of the murder. In addition, several witnesses testified seeing Acorn with West in the months after West claims his son had killed her.
West did not display much of a reaction when the verdict was handed down; he was stoic as he was led out of the courtroom. Acorn’s family and friends were overjoyed; they hugged each other in the courtroom and were very emotional.
