A financial advisor strangled a La Jolla man in a plot to steal $7.5 million from him, a prosecutor told a jury on Nov. 8 as a murder trial opened in San Diego Superior Court. Kent Thomas Keigwin, 61, is accused of killing John G. Watson, 65, in his La Jolla home in June 2010. Keigwin, a certified public accountant, is also charged with the special circumstance of murder for financial gain, identity theft, forgery, burglary and with using Watson\u2019s personal identification. Jury selection began Nov. 7 before Superior Court Judge Fred Link, during which attorneys questioned potential jurors. During opening statements, Deputy District Attorney Sharla Evert said the victim\u2019s fingernails were scraped and DNA from Keigwin was found. Keigwin\u2019s fingerprints were found on an interior doorknob, she said. Evert said Keigwin used Watson\u2019s identification in February 2009 to open an account with Scottrade, an online brokerage firm. She said Keigwin also filed a change of address for Watson to a post office box and created a Yahoo account under Watson\u2019s name. San Diego police officers were investigating Watson\u2019s death three days after his body was discovered when Keigwin showed up at Watson\u2019s residence at 6:30 a.m. in possession of keys to the home, an empty backpack that contained a surgical mask and empty bags, Evert said. Watson was a retired biotech executive and a board member of Tech Coast Angels, an investment group that provides money for startup companies. Keigwin\u2019s attorney, Yahairah Aristy, told jurors the case was about fraud, not murder. “Things are not always what they seem. Listen with your common sense,” she said. Witnesses began testifying Nov. 9 in what is expected to be a three-week trial. Attorneys plan to call 39 witnesses. Keigwin has pleaded not guilty and remains in custody without bail.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A financial advisor strangled a La Jolla man in a plot to steal $7.5 million from him, a prosecutor told a jury on Nov. 8 as a murder trial opened in San Diego Superior Court. Kent Thomas Keigwin, 61, is accused of killing John G. Watson, 65, in his La Jolla home in June 2010. […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":726,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11560","_seopress_titles_title":"Trial opens for 2010 murder of La Jolla man","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[11560,11593],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-303753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-la-jolla-village-news","category-no-images"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/726"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=303753"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/303753\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=303753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=303753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=303753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}