The trial for James Zarate continued this week with three more witnesses testifying and unfortunately from the news reports it’s not looking real good for the prosecution.

The first witness was Detective Mark Bendul of the Bergen County Prosecutor’s Office. He was the detective at the time of the Zarate Brother’s arrest who first interviewed James Zarate. Detective Bendul testified that James Zarate claimed that his brother was solely responsible for the murder of Jennifer Parks and that James Zarate only admitted to helping his brother trying to dispose of Jennifer’s body.

The next witness was Shannon Price, a fingerprint expert for the Federal Bureau of Investigation. She testified that without a doubt James Zarate’s fingerprint was on one of the trash bags that contained Jennifer Parks’ severed legs. However, under cross-examination, she could not say exactly when the fingerprint got there saying that latent prints can sometimes last for years.

The third witness was 19-year-old Vladimir Basilio. He was the third teen who was arrested along with the Zarate brothers for trying to dump Jennifer’s body in the Passaic River. He testified in court that James Zarate told him that he was responsible for stabbing Jennifer and punching her while his brother held her. However, his testimony has been inconsistent from the start and it seems like the defense attorney ripped him apart.

So far it seems like the only thing the prosecution has going for it is the forensic evidence along with the coroner’s testimony.

James Zarate will go to jail, there’s no doubt in my mind about that. Whether it’s for Jennifer’s murder I just don’t know.