BAKERSFIELD, Calif. (KGET) — In blistering questioning Thursday, defense counsel suggested a California City police officer who investigated the disappearance of Orrin and Orson West failed to properly document evidence and missed numerous signs supporting statements given by the boys’ adoptive parents.
Officer Brian Hansen responded with “I don’t know” or “I don’t recall” to numerous questions posed by attorney Alekxia Torres Stallings.
She represents Jacqueline West, who, along with husband Trezell West, faces charges including second-degree murder in the deaths of Orrin, 4, and Orson, 3. The couple reported the children missing in December 2020 and were indicted last year. The boys’ bodies have not been found.
Hansen testified he didn’t know if he went inside the Wests’ van parked outside their California City home. He didn’t know if police seized “little fingerprints” found on a sliding glass door on the West home. He couldn’t remember if he identified himself as a police officer before questioning the Wests’ four other children, and was unaware if any of them had specialized needs or educational disabilities.
Torres Stallings noted Thursday was the first time Hansen, who has provided testimony at multiple prior hearings, said he viewed surveillance footage from a home on Harvard Avenue. Previously — and as recently as March 9 — he said he only viewed footage from two homes. The Harvard Avenue footage makes three.
The attorney asked Hansen if he lied previously, or was he lying now.
“Neither,” he responded.
Hansen has been on the stand two days. Prosecutor Eric Smith earlier played a video of an interview Hansen and other law enforcement conducted with Trezell West.
The Wests said the boys were playing outside as Trezell West gathered firewood. According to their account, Trezell West briefly went inside, and when he came back out the boys were gone.
In the video, officers accuse Trezell West of lying, saying he and his wife’s stories don’t make sense. The Wests reported Orrin and Orson missing Dec. 21, 2020, but the couple’s other children told authorities they hadn’t seen the boys in weeks. Trezell West denied having anything to do with the boys’ disappearance despite police telling him there was no evidence showing the boys were at their house that night.
Torres Stallings pushed back against those claims. She displayed photographs showing presents wrapped and stockings hung for Orrin and Orson, a bunk bed set up for Orson, eight dining room chairs — one for each family member including the missing boys — and a used diaper found in a bathroom after a search warrant was served at the Wests’ house on Aspen Avenue on Dec. 29, 2020.17
Hansen said he’d never seen the photo of the diaper. Only Orrin and Orson, the two youngest, were at an age where they’d be in diapers.
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Under redirect examination by Smith, Hansen testified he didn’t take the photos that defense counsel showed him Thursday and didn’t know who took them. Hansen said he doesn’t know what took place in the Wests’ home from the time he searched it on Dec. 22, 2020, to when the warrant was served and photos taken on Dec. 29, 2020.
Smith played an audio recording of Hansen radioing in to dispatch the night the boys were reported missing to say he was examining video footage at the Harvard Avenue residence. It’s not something he recently made up, he said in response to the prosecutor’s questions.
The trial will resume April 10.
