Page 8 - David Mcmannis News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

Attorney, michael bross, said his view those detectives focused on the wrong man. said phil barr's accomplice must have been peewee st. john, the man who'd turned in jewelry three days after tara went missing. >> there's enough circumstantial evidence to believe that he was involved if not in the murder, but definitely in the complicity to cover it up. >> reporter: the only thing that dave mcmannis was guilty of, said bross was being a sarcastic guy. >> the majority of the statements that were made were sarcasm at best. so if he's guilty -- >> it's a claim. yeah. and that's kind of an easy out...

>> "they're not gonna find her." >> "i'm going to kill you like i killed the girl in florida." "the girl i killed was 20." >> reporter: one witness testified about overhearing a conversation between barr and mcmannis. >> phillip barr was saying to david mcmannis, "i didn't want to kill her." and she overheard david mcmannis respond, "she had to die." >> reporter: not very believable, said the defense attorneys. just people making things up, said barr's lawyer, mark de sisto. >> we contended that those conversations never took place. >> reporter: some of those witnesses were inmates, too, snitc...

>> and that was, kind of -- how important was that in the -- >> extremely important. she -- she identified david mcmannis as being at the house with barr. she identified him there at a time when the pickup truck was backed up to the front door. what other reason was that pickup truck backed up the front door other than to take tara out of that house? >> reporter: we went out to the house to get a better idea of where this woman was sitting and what she could have seen. >> so, she's sitting right here. >> wow. so that's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, nine, 10, like maybe a dozen steps...

Two men coming and going from tara's house -- >> could it be she made herself believe this over so much of a time to make sure the bad guy goes away? >> reporter: dave mcmannis' attorney, michael bross, said his view those detectives focused on the wrong man. said phil barr's accomplice must have been peewee st. john, the man who'd turned in jewelry three days after tara went missing. >> there's enough circumstantial evidence to believe that he was involved if not in the murder, but definitely in the complicity to cover it up. >> reporter: the only thing that dave mcmannis was guilty of, said ...

Except the neighbor happened to mention that her sister-in-law had been visiting that day. but, no one had ever interviewed her. >> kurt, i think, had found her name and said, "hey, do you -- who is this person?" and mike said, "oh, i know someone by that name." so mike then went out and-- and located her and spoke to her. >> what'd she have to say? >> she floored me. >> reporter: why? that visitor was not blocked by the fence like her relatives were. she'd been sitting in full view not more than 15 yards from tara's front door, and she saw a lot. >> she did see a vehicle pull in a couple diff...