KINGMAN – A young man facing possible life behind bars instead gained freedom when a Mohave County Superior Court jury acquitted him at his sex offense trial in Kingman Wednesday morning, May 15. Keith Jones, 22, was charged with five counts each of sexual assault and sexual conduct with a minor for alleged activity with an underage female teenager in Kingman.
Determining insufficient evidence to merit conviction, Judge Derek Carlisle dismissed three of the ten charges late Tuesday before jurors returned to deliberate the other counts Wednesday. 40 minutes later, the panel acquitted Jones of all of the other charges.
Jones was released from custody after spending more than seven months at the Adult Detention Center.
Attorneys told the jury from the onset that this was a “he-said/she-said” case, absent physical evidence and eyewitness testimony, and much a credibility contest between the victim and the defendant.
Defense attorney Paul Amann told jurors that the alleged victim provided inconsistent and sometimes conflicting versions about Jones forcing himself upon her at three different Kingman homes over a two-year period ending in 2022.
“In speaking with jurors afterwards, they expressed that the state had no evidence and wondered why the case had been brought in the first place,” Amann said, after the trial.
Dave Hawkins
