Aaron Deshong, 50, called the FBI last September and alluded to shooting his mother and older brother, prosecutors said. His attorney said it would be difficult to prove that he did so.
After years of family tension, Aaron Deshong gunned down his mother and older brother last September, and then called the FBI, Montgomery County prosecutors said Monday at the start of his murder trial.
But what the 50-year-old Perkiomen Township man said -- and meant -- during that phone call is likely to be a key will factor in the case.
Deshong's defense attorney, Nicholas Reifsnyder, said his client never admitted to pulling the trigger on that September night in 2023, and said prosecutors would have difficulty proving he did so in a case with no eyewitnesses or a confession.
But Assistant District Attorney Libby Hemler said Deshong clearly alluded to his crime that night during what she described as his "casual conversation" with the FBI: When asked whether he had hurt his family or whether they were alive, Deshong said only, "that's a good question."
Wanda Deshong, 74, and her older son, Adam, 53, were found dead in the kitchen of the home on Gravel Pike that she shared with her younger son, police said. She had sustained gunshot wounds to her right hand and head and was found slumped on the floor just a few feet away from Adam Deshong, who had been shot in his back and head.
Adam Deshong, who lived with his wife in Devon, was visting his mother's house when the shooting took place, Hemler said.
Aaron Deshong was still on the phone with the FBI when Pennsylvania State Police troopers arrived at the home and took him into custody, according to testimony Monday. He had gunshot residue on his hands, and was carrying a key that unlocked a closet where the .38 caliber revolver used in the shooting was recovered.
Deshong had purchased the gun in 2004, according to prosecutors.
He later told detectives in an interview that he had been "on edge" since his father's death, according to the affidavit of probable for his arrest. But the motive behind the killings remained unclear.
Hemler said Monday that the shooting came after "years of pent-up aggression" from Deshongwho had a falling out with his older brother after their father's death and had stopped speaking to his extended family, according to the prosecutor.
Reifsnyder, Deshong's attorney, told jurors that even if they believed that he killed his mother and brother, evidence in the case would prove that it was a premeditated act, and therefore first-degree murder.
The trial is expected to last through Wednesday before Montgomery County Court Judge William Carpenter.