Crest

The prosecution rested its case Friday against a Crest man charged with killing his elderly mother and burying her on their property.

The defense will begin its case Tuesday in the murder trial of Ashley Demers, 26.

Demers has pleaded innocent by reason of insanity in the Nov. 10 death of Anna Demers, 67, whose body was discovered Jan. 2 after he told sheriff’s deputies where he had buried her.

His attorney, Bill Boyland, told jurors Thursday that a vision of TV evangelist Jerry Falwell commanded his client to kill his mother. Boyland is likely to call psychiatric witnesses next week.

Deputy Dist. Atty. Gregg McClain played another tape recording Friday of a Jan. 2 interview between Demers and Detective Robert Sams at the Alpine sheriff’s substation. On the tape, Demers calmly describes what clothing he wore when he allegedly bashed his mother’s head with a rock.

The young man, who Boyland said has been diagnosed as chronic schizophrenic, said he used a green wheelbarrow to cart his mother’s body away.

Demers cried softly in San Diego Superior Court as the tape was played before the jury and Judge Norbert Ehrenfreund.

The prosecution presented six witnesses in all, including the deputy sheriffs who responded after a neighbor reported Anna Demers missing.

If the jury finds Demers guilty, it will deliberate on whether he was sane at the time of the killing. If found to be insane, Demers will probably be committed to a state mental hospital, possibly for life. If he is found sane, he will probably be sent to state prison.

Boyland said Anna Demers watched Falwell, who founded a conservative political group called the Moral Majority, on his TV ministry program, which originates from his Bible college at Lynchburg, Va.