'He cut up the mother of his child' - Prosecution closing statements — Bhatt Murder Trial

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: The days are coming that you will regret a lot. The defendant, in his own words, told us what he was going to do. The days are coming that you will regret a lot. That's a text message. That the defendant sent to Maqta Kothler. He told Maqta what he was going to do with her. 162 days later, that day came. 162 days later, he delivered on that promise. 162 days later, the defendant murdered Maqta Kothler. The defendant dismembered Maqta Kothler. Maqta Kothler and the defendant got rid of her like garbage. Now, who is Maqta? Who was Maqta? Maqta was educated. Maqta was beautiful. Maqta was brave. Maqta was love. Maqta was the love that she gave to her mother, Gita Kothler. Maqta was the love that she gave to her father, Dili Kothler. Maqta was the love that she gave to her brothers, Mahesh and Manesh Kothler. Maqta was the love that she gave Mini Maqta, her daughter. Maqta was also the love of this defendant right here. She loved this man. She truly loved him. She tried her best to keep her family together. Pursue her American dream. With that guy right there, seated at this table. Create a better life for herself. Her daughter, Mini Maqta. Her family. Mom, to try to do this. All while living at the hands of a king. The Raja. The Raja. Who ruled his house with an iron fist. The Raja who cut off Maqta's phone. The Raja. Who restricted her access to money. Who restricted her access to money. A car. A Raja. A Raja who did not love her. A Raja who mistreated her. Abused her. The Raja. Actively searched. Actively searched. [00:04:22] Speaker ?: Actively searched. [00:04:22] Speaker 1: For a good girl. A Colombian girl. All while he was still married to Maqta Khafli. According to the king. According to the king. According to the king. The Raja. Maqta didn't listen to him. Maqta didn't listen to her parents. His parents. Maqta didn't clean. Like she was supposed to. Maqta no longer fit. The mold that he had created for her. And to the mold that he wanted her to stay in. She no longer fit in that. She was pursuing her American dream. She was going to be an American citizen. With her daughter. According to the Raja. Maqta kept bad company. Bad company. Friends who saw her crying. Friends who consoled her. Friends who cared for her. Gave her support. Friends who helped her get a phone. Get her own bank account. Friends who tried to help her be independent. The reality was. Maqta. Lived in a house of terrors. At 9408 Heather Court. With this man. A kingdom of torture. Where the king reigned. Few short years into this marriage. This man who stands. Charged with her murder. Judge. Her jury. And her executioner. Now. What was her sin? Again. She didn't fit into that mold. That he wanted her to be in. Now. Why are we all here? The defendant stands charged with. Three different charges. Murder in the first degree. Of Manta Cople. Concealing. Of her body. And defiling of her body. And now the defendant wants you to believe. And now the defendant wants you to believe. His story. His made up. Crazy story. All the defendant has done. That you've seen. From the moment. From the moment that Manta went missing. All he did was lie. He lied to every single person. And it's hard to keep up with lies. Start slipping up. Thank you. Thank you. [00:09:14] Speaker ?: Thank you. [00:09:44] Speaker 1: Thank you. That the defendant was going to get up on that stand and testify that Mamta committed suicide. And I was thinking about this, like, of course he's going to come up with this kind of story. Why? [00:10:34] Speaker ?: Why? [00:10:34] Speaker 1: Think about it. The colonel's evidence was so overwhelming. We presented almost 100 witnesses to you. Almost 500 exhibits in this case. Now, the defendant did not have to testify at all in this case. He chose to do something. And he would have had an absolute right not to testify. But he chose to. That's important. He had to admit what he could not deny and deny what he could not admit. But again, he had to admit what he could not deny and deny what he couldn't admit. What did he admit to? He admitted to dismembering his wife. Mom took conflict. Mom took conflict. Using a saw. He admitted that he couldn't fit her into the garbage can. He had to cut her up into pieces to get her in there. And he had to do a couple tries. The first time she didn't fit, he had to take her out, cut her up, put her back in there. He had to admit that he cut up the mother of his child. He admitted that he concealed her death from her loved ones. It was for the first time last week, November 9th, that Gita Mahesh found out what truly happened to Mom. He concealed her death from mom, from brother, from family, from friends. Admitted that he lied. He admitted all of these different things. What he wants you to believe now, that even though he cut up Mom's body, even though he stuffed her in the garbage can, he had nothing to do with her death. Come on. That is ridiculous. [00:14:14] Speaker ?: Thank you. [00:14:44] Speaker 1: He's the one suffering. Listen to that. He's the one who's suffering here. [00:15:14] Speaker ?: He's the one who's suffering. He's the one who's suffering. [00:16:11] Speaker 1: The defendant wants you to believe that Mamta committed suicide. And what does he never do? Ladies and gentlemen, he's lying again. He wants you to believe that somehow he came and found Mamta dead with vomit and blood mixed in. He was not responsive. It was a misunderstanding. He panicked. He panicked over the course of a few days. His mom to lay there dead. He panicked so much. He had to figure out how to get rid of her body. He had to figure out how to scrub the carpet clean. He had to rearrange the bedroom. That's how bad he panicked. And what for? His explanation that we heard from this witness stand? He thought he was going to get blamed for committing suicide. He was such a bad husband. That he did all of that to cover up a suicide. Because he was a bad husband. I'll give it to him. He was a terrible husband. But Mamta did not commit suicide. Because he was a terrible husband. And why is he lying about that? And how do we know that he's lying? About being afraid. About being blamed as the terrible husband. Around that time, we have evidence that Mamta was trying so hard to keep up appearances. Heard. People testified. Their relationship appeared pretty good. After the February time. After the March time. People didn't really know what was going on in that household. Desperately wanted to keep this family together. Now, ladies and gentlemen. The question is not whether you can imagine a world where Mamta somehow committed suicide. The real question that you have to resolve amongst yourselves does it match the multitude of evidence that has been presented to you? Does it make sense? Absolutely not. He had to admit the concealing and the defiling. And why did he have to do that? Because he's hoping to control the final narrative of this saga. He's hoping to control the narrative just like he tried to control Mamta. He's trying to control you. He wants you to go back in that deliberation room talk amongst yourselves and say well that guy he admitted to pretty terrible things chopping up Mamta literally using a saw on her body stuffing her in the garbage can getting rid of her belongings so he must be telling the truth now that is what he wants don't let him control the narrative. Now what specific things did the defendant have to admit to? Everything in the videos that we presented to you in our case in chief. All of the dumpings that he's doing at various times of day and night at locations with gloves on. What else did he have to admit to? Buying that pack of knives from the Walmart in Liberia. He obviously bought those knives. Investigators never found two of the knives. He had a great explanation as to what happened with them. He donated them with Mamta's blood on it after he tried using it to carve up her body. He left it at the babysitter's place. Perhaps another member of the community could make use of the knives he tried to cut his wife with. Think about that. He was so considerate for the public and other people. Never for his wife. He had to admit to the cleaning supplies at the Fairfax Walmart. 409, Lysol, all of that. Now let's talk about the forensic evidence. He had a great story to fit the evidence. The blood in the bathroom. He just chopped her up. He didn't kill her. He just chopped her up in there. In the bedroom, the blue star. There's a lot of focus on this cross-contamination aspect of things by defense. Let me tell you, when law enforcement entered 9408 on August 21st, 2024, they had no idea what they were walking into. Mamta was missing. Not dead yet for the public to know. They were looking for anything to help them, guide them to finding Mamta or her whereabouts. But he still had a great story. He took this poison that was on the floor in the linen closet, some poison that you can't find here. She vomited. There was vomit and blood and all of that could have been what the blue star showed. He could see the powder selfos, the powder pesticide in the vomit. Common sense, ladies and gentlemen. Does that make any sense to you? He saw two times spicy ramen in there, too. very detailed. Remember, as you're reviewing this stuff, tell yourself common sense, common sense. There's a jury instruction that tells you you use your common sense. get to his Google searches. I'll get to this later. But he had a pretty good explanation for some of them. Oh, my friend was divorced and like she wanted to see what happened to the debt of her spouse. Oh, but the Happy New Year girlfriend one, the one where he's searching how to send a Happy New Year message to his girlfriend, didn't recall doing that one. On the same day as other searches. So he admitted stuff that he could explain away and then denied, did not recall everything else. Now, I think as you look back on this case, there's one important thing to keep in mind. The defendant underestimated the community. The love that Momta had amongst everyone. He underestimated the great work that Manassas Park Police Department did in this case, Prince William County Police Department, the FBI, and just individual members of this community. If it wasn't for them, he wouldn't have had to got up there and testify the way he did. Now, why did he do all of this stuff? He wanted to benefit from you. Open. You find him guilty of those other charges and you're like, you know what? We'll let him go on that first degree murder charge. That's his only way out. I think part of what you have to also think about was over the approximately two days that he testified, we didn't need an ounce of emotion from him. Not a single tear. Nothing. He couldn't even call mom to buy her name. She was the dead body. The dead body. Can you imagine that? You were testifying that you found your wife dead? And you decided to cut her up? But she's just a dead body to you? Really? He put on a great performance. Not good enough. He couldn't even fake a tear for mom to know what his story did tell though. His disdain for mom to the woman who loved him. He sprinkled little things throughout his testimony. Not sit right. Laughed and said I tried to control remember that mold. That mold that she's not fitting into. He called her lazy after she gave birth to Nima. After she went through a traumatic birth. She was lazy. testified that mentally doing this labor cutting manta mentally it was hard but physically it was not. Interesting. got to remove ligaments crushed bones. [00:29:55] Speaker ?: It [00:29:55] Speaker 1: definitely was hard time. Think back to the August 1st Liberty gas station video where he is limping. it was physically hard not mentally for him. Now let's get to the crux of the case. I'm really not even going to bother with the concealing or defile. Remember those black holes defense counsel talked about opening statement? I didn't know he was going to be the one to help fill them. Guilty of defiling and concealing her body. First degree murder. we have to prove that he killed Mamta. It was willful, deliberate, premeditated, and with malice. How do we get there? Let's talk about the timeline. For all intents and purposes, this marriage, Mamta and Naresh's marriage, was pretty much over in February of 2024. How do we know that? We all watched the video that defense entered into evidence. One of the 16 pieces of evidence where the defendant is recording Mamta calling Manassas Park police. Look at that video. She looks scared. She looks scared. Probably like the look she had for most of her relationship with this defendant. In that particular video, at the very end, the defendant tells her, thank you. Being sarcastic. Thank you. [00:32:24] Speaker ?: Thank you. [00:32:25] Speaker 1: everything is finished now. Why is that significant? Mamta was putting his top security clearance at risk. He was messing with his livelihood, calling the police. He would have to explain that with his top-notch security clearance. That in turn would disrupt his lovely life that he had built by that point. The appearances that he cared so much for. You heard the man. He was in the military to wear a uniform to be thanked for service. This man was all about appearances. Mamta was messing that up in February. Told her the marriage was over. Now, by no measure was he husband of the year at any time before this. But this single event changed the trajectory of relationship for the months after that. From that moment, he became a scorned Raja, a king. From that moment is when he starts plotting and planning how to kill his wife. no normal person searches the things that we presented to you. About a wife disappearing in a divorce. About her dying. No normal person does that. Look at April 26, 2024. on his White House military account. Most dangerous danger tourist area east coast. What does that mean? It's pretty plain and simple. He was researching different ways as to how he could get this done. It was to make her disappear. whatever else he had planned. From that point as he's planning this Google searching in February, March, a lot of months in between. texting Rodolfo that he wants a good Colombian woman. All while he's married to Mamta still. He's actively seeking out relationships. While Mamta is still his wife. Mamta who's trying to make it work. devised the reciprocating saw second in 2024. This is months after the initial Google searches. This is months after. He tells her it's over. This is months after he texts her. The days are coming that you will regret a lot. He's holding the saw that he uses to put up Mamta Koffle. If it weren't for Jose we would have never probably known that. [00:36:53] Speaker ?: this [00:36:58] Speaker 1: is a man who had a plan not a great one eventually kills her early morning hours of July 30th 2000. does all of these things explain away that ask yourself one question not call 911. A normal person who finds their wife dead on the floor with some supposed poison calls 911 and somehow he wants us to believe it's a cultural thing. Are you kidding? He called the police on Akash. He knew how to do that but couldn't do it in this case. This story doesn't make sense. You heard from the expert that the commonwealth scrambled to find is [00:38:32] Speaker ?: that the [00:38:32] Speaker 1: poison that he's claiming mom to use to kill herself is activated by water. It creates a gas. So this whole I found her dead with this powder that I could definitely tell was this poison then I started putting water on her and then I did CPR for 45 minutes to an hour is unbelievable. That is the best story he could come up with to make the evidence fit his own narrative to try to get some sort of benefit. Cannot emphasize this more ladies and gentlemen. that defendant all he cares about is himself not even his daughter not even his daughter he was trying to get rid of [00:39:33] Speaker ?: him [00:39:34] Speaker 1: trying to donate his baby that's a man who doesn't care about anyone not his own daughter and definitely not his wife that he murdered mom too was not suicidal mom too was sad that any normal person would be all get sad I get sad does it mean that I'm going to kill myself if someone is sad or depressed about the state of their relationship does not mean that they will kill themselves and how narcissistic of the defendant to think that mom took killed herself because of him to say that that's narcissism at its peak and then to blame her and 11 month old with her mother laying dead are you kidding me mom too was loving mom too was loved her favorite color was red he had so much to live for family friends he was going to be a United States citizen there was no indication that Manta would have committed suicide heard detective Ventura tell you that as a mother he knew something was wrong a mother of an 11 month old child would not have just gotten up and left definitely not committed suicide she had plans she loved that little girl and somehow the defendant wants us to believe that she committed suicide so unhappy about her relationship with him and he was contemplating suicide during this moment of panic for days and then he looked over and saw toys and remember he has a daughter so he can't commit suicide but he expects us to believe that Manta would the mother of that child common sense remember reasonable doubt has to be based on the evidence that was presented to you not on outside stuff nothing suggests that Manta killed herself that is the defendant's last hurrah to try to control her her narrative and her legacy and he knows that the only other person to refute the ridiculous evidence that actually does not make sense is no longer here he gave her a final resting place of the landfill in LeRae Virginia Manta Manta [00:43:45] Speaker ?: Manta Manta Manta Manta [00:43:45] Speaker 1: will always be missing for that family there always be missing we know she's dead but she is missing because they will never be able to give her last rites she she is in pieces crushed in some landfill somewhere that is what this family will have to live with is going to have to grow up and live with that that is not a woman who committed suicide it's a woman that loves her baby a [00:44:32] Speaker ?: woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman a woman [00:45:01] Speaker 1: That's not a person who committed to a question. That's a woman who loved her child. Listening to the defendant testify in this case is just another way he's trying to control everyone. Throw the narrative, explain everything away. It's like he tried to explain everything away before he got arrested and lie. You lie. Don't make sense. Mamta had no reason to kill herself. The defendant had absolutely every reason to get rid of her. Motive, opportunity, intent. Premeditation. Months of premeditation. Typically, in first-degree murder cases, we don't see months of premeditation. You have a jury instruction that says premeditation can be instantaneous. A moment before. We have months of him planning on what to do with Mamta. Now, when it benefited him, after almost two years, he told Mahesh and Gita what happened to their daughter. Twisted it to fit his own narrative and benefit him. But finally, they know. Don't get confused by the red herring. Bennett is a master manipulator, master liar. All of the evidence that you've heard, including his own testimony, there's only one reasonable verdict in this case. Guilty on all three charges. Don't let him control the lasting memory of Mamta. Do not let him do that.