May 6 — Gurpreet Singh’s capital murder retrial continued for a second week with a DNA expert testifying on the stand about the clothes the defendant wore on the 2019 West Chester Township night four homicides were tested positive to the blood of his deceased wife.
The 41-year-old former truck driver is accused of fatally shooting his wife Shalinderjit Kaur, 39; his in-laws, Hakikat Singh Pannag, 59, and Parmjit Kaur, 62; and her aunt-in-law, Amarjit Kaur, 58, at their lakefront apartment on Wyntree Drive.
A three-judge panel, consisting of Judges Greg Howard, Greg Stephens and Keith Spaeth, is evaluating the evidence this time around. Singh’s first trial ended before a hung jury in October 2022.
Both the defense and prosecution agree that Singh was present when four members of his family were shot and killed in their West Chester Township. apartment, but prosecutors say he was the killer and the defense says he was a witness.
Hallie Dreyer, now a supervisor with the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation, gave the results of tests performed on several pieces of evidence collected by the West Chester Township Police Department. including a red shirt, jeans, socks and a belt that Singh was wearing the night of the murders.
Shalinderjit’s DNA was found in the blood on Singh’s T-shirt and jeans, which were stained with a large amount of blood, Dreyer testified. DNA from the other victims was not found on Singh.
Blood was found on the handle of the gun that prosecutors believed was the murder weapon, but was not suitable for testing, according to Dreyer.
The firearm, a 9-millimeter Ruger SR9, was thrown into a pond outside the apartment where it was not recovered for a few days. This degrades the ability to pass DNA tests, Dreyer said.
None of the shell casings found at the scene tested positive for Singh’s DNA and a blood sample taken from the patio outside that apartment was Hakikat’s, according to Dreyer.
Last week, a parade of West Chester police officers testified Tuesday and Wednesday about the collection of evidence at the scene of the April 20, 2019, shooting, including a Beretta handgun with ammunition in the girl’s bedroom closet. Singh and $930 in cash on a prayer table next to one of the victims. and $8,250 in cash in a pink purse also located in the master bedroom.
The panel was shown photos of the gun stored in a bag, with prosecutor Josh Muennich emphasizing that the gun was not the murder weapon, but evidence that “the defendant had access to the firearm and ammunition at the time of the offense.
The defense said Singh witnessed the shooting deaths of his family but did not kill them, pointing to other people with criminal backgrounds who had an ongoing land dispute with Hakikat Singh Pannag as suspects.
Some of the body camera footage was played in court as Sgt. Travis Oakes interviewed Singh, who was distressed and paused to answer questions, but identified the people living in the apartment.
When the man Singh called his brother, Maninder Sekhon Singh, showed up at the scene, Oakes said he was a person of interest. But a video was found…
