Prosecutors in Aaron Hernandez’s double murder trial claim there’s a confession hiding in plain sight.
Tattoo artist David Nelson took the stand Friday at Suffolk Superior Court in Boston after prosecutors claimed he unknowingly tattooed a confession to the 2012 murders of Daniel de Abreu and Safiro Furtado on Hernandez’s arm. The former New England Patriots tight end’s lawyers deny that claim.
According to The Boston Globe’s Travis Andersen, Nelson testified that he tattooed Hernandez and his fiancée, Shayanna Jenkins, in the spring of 2013 when he worked at Hermosa Ink in Hermosa Beach, Calif. The tattoo in question featured “a front view of a pistol like it’s pointing at you” and the “part of a revolver that holds bullets,” as well as the words “God Forgives” written backward.
Nelson testified those were the directions Hernandez gave him, and the former Patriot wanted one empty chamber in the cylinder. Hernandez chose a photo of the cylinder from the Internet, Nelson said, though the artist admitted he “might have made suggestions to how it would be improved aesthetically.”
Hernandez allegedly fired a 104-year-old revolver five times to kill Abreu and Furtado in their car in Boston’s South End neighborhood on July 16, 2012.
This is Hernandez’s second murder trial. The 27-year-old already is serving a life sentence after being convicted of first-degree murder in the shooting death of semi-professional football player Odin Lloyd.
Thumbnail photo via The Sun Chronicle/Pool Photo via USA TODAY Sports Images
