Ex-NFL player Aaron Hernandez found not guilty in double murder case
The former New England Patriots tight end will remain jailed for life.
— -- Former New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez has been found not guilty in a double murder.
Hernandez, 27, was charged with shooting and killing two men outside of a bar in Massachusetts in 2012. Prosecutors argued that Hernandez killed Daniel Abreu and Safiro Furtado because he felt disrespected when one of them bumped him and spilled his drink.
Jurors in Boston reached the verdict after six days of deliberations, acquitting Hernandez of first-degree murder, armed assault with intent to murder, assault and battery with a dangerous weapon and witness intimidation but convicting him of unlawful possession of a gun. The judge added four to five years onto Hernandez's prison sentence for that charge, separate from his existing life sentence.
After the verdict was read, Hernandez hugged his attorneys and supporters before he was led away. He will be transferred to another part of the state to continue serving a life sentence for a prior murder conviction.
The defense blamed a friend of Hernandez, Alexander Bradley, who was with him that night, claiming that Bradley opened fire on the victims' car as they waited at a stoplight.
Bradley is serving prison time for an unrelated conviction.
Hernandez will remain in jail for life for his involvement in the 2013 killing of Odin Lloyd. He was convicted of that murder in 2015 after a nine-week trial. Members of that jury found that Hernandez used "extreme atrocity or cruelty" in the killing.
Lloyd was shot six times and the murder weapon was never found.
Hernandez played for the Patriots from 2010 to 2012 and was cut after he was charged with Lloyd's murder. His trial on the Abreu and Furtado's murders began as the Patriots were in contention for the Super Bowl this year.