Prosecutors allege Michelle Troconis played a role in the 2019 disappearance of Jennifer Farber Dulos. But the defendant’s Venezuelan family, who are attending the trial every day, haven’t been afraid to make their support known amidst the highly anticipated trial.

“On behalf of my daughter, who we know … is innocent, we are trusting the fair trial and we hope the result will be favorable for everybody,” Ms. Troconis’ father said outside the courtroom on Thursday.

Ms. Troconis, the Venezuelan co-founder of horse riding therapy programs and a former TV host for ESPN South America, is facing charges of conspiracy to commit murder, tampering with evidence and hindering prosecution in the presumed death of Jennifer – a mother of five who went missing on May 24, 2019, after dropping her children off at school in the wealthy town of New Canaan, Connecticut. At the time, Jennifer was in the middle of an ugly custody battle with her estranged husband, Fotis Dulos – the then-boyfriend of Ms. Traconis. 

Jennifer was finally legally declared dead late last year after four years of “extensive efforts” to locate her body.

“The overwhelming evidence submitted to the Court supports the claim that Jennifer sustained non-survivable injuries,” Judge William P. Osterndorf’s October 2023 ruling stated. “The inescapable conclusion is Jennifer is dead.”

According to prosecutors, those “non-survivable injuries” were caused by Fotis, a high-end contractor who met Jennifer during their undergraduate years at Brown, when he attacked Jennifer in the garage of her New Canaan rental home before disposing of her body. Prosecutors allege Ms. Troconis played a role by helping to create an alibi for Fotis the day of the crime and helping him clean up a red pickup truck he borrowed from an employee of his struggling contracting business to use for the crime.

Fotis had been charged with murder when he died in January 2020, just days after aa suicide attempt from which he never regained consciousness. Now, there are only two people facing charges in the disappearance of Jennifer – Ms. Troconis and Fotis’ longtime friend and lawyer, Kent Mawhinney, who has also been accused of manufacturing an alibi for Fotis when Jennifer went missing. Both Ms. Traconis and Mr. Mawhinney have pleaded not guilty, but the latter will have to wait for his turn to stand trial and there has been speculation in Connecticut legal circles that he may testify against Ms. Troconis.

So far, the six-member jury who will decide Ms. Troconis’ fate has been presented with a variety of testimony and evidence pertaining mostly to the day of the alleged crime. Some of that evidence includes body cam and crime scene footage from the day of Jennifer’s disappearance. One video shows officers searching Jennifer’s home after she was reported missing and stumbling upon blood-like stains in the garage.

“It’s strange to me that we have this in connection with a missing person,” one officer can be heard saying in reference to finding the stains they presumed to be blood. The possibility of a deer strike was brought up, but the officers noted there was a lack of fur at the scene.

Other testimony shared how a police sergeant found a print on the doorknob of the door between the garage and the house’s living quarters, and another sergeant mapped out the crime scene with markings for suspected blood stains. The latter sergeant also talked about finding Jennifer’s black Chevy Suburban abandoned at a New Canaan park.

One contentious piece of testimony that’s delayed the trial’s proceedings has been talk about presumptive blood testing at the crime scene. When witnesses tried to testify about such testing, defense attorney Jon Schoenhorn quickly reacted with objections calling the tests “junk science.”

“There is a chemical spray that police use in investigations. I can say it’s sort of like fairy dust, right? They spray aerosol, and if it glows, one of the things it might show is blood. But things like bleach, rust, paint, turpentine—there’s probably 50 or 100 things that also glow with a black light,” Mr. Schoenhorn said.

After arguing that testimony about these tests would be confusing to the jury and unfairly prejudicial to Ms. Troconis, Mr. Schoenhorn’s first objection was shut down by the judge, in part because later tests done by a lab confirmed the presence of blood.

Even so, Mr. Schoenhorn objected when retired Connecticut State Police Sgt. Matthew Reilly also began sharing testimony about a presumptive blood test. After he found what appeared to be blood on a paper towel roll, he decided to perform a  blood test.  Mr. Schoenhorn again objected, and the jury was let go for the long, Martin Luther King Jr.’s Birthday weekend after the judge said the issue needed to be discussed without the jury’s presence. 

“None of this points to my sister,” Michelle’s sister Claudia said as she and her father left the courthouse on Friday.

The trial is expected to last about six weeks, and it looks like there may be many more objections concerning what the jury should and shouldn’t see as the prosecution builds their case. 

The trial will resume on Tuesday, Jan. 16, and prosecutors are eventually expected to present evidence pertaining to Fotis and Ms. Troconis’ drive around Hartford, Connecticut, the day of Jennifer’s disappearance – including a surveillance video showing Fotis disposing of garbage bags as Ms. Troconis sits inside the vehicle. Prosecutors are also expected to share a document being dubbed “the alibi script” which they says shows how Ms. Traconis and her then-boyfriend detailed their actions and locations on the day of the alleged crime.