Warning: Details in this report are disturbing.
Evidence from the bedroom where prosecutors allege Naresh Bhatt murdered and dismembered his wife, Mamta Bhatt, brought the jury to its feet on Thursday.
Every juror stood up to get a look of an 8-foot by 10-foot section of carpet investigators removed from the Bhatts’ primary bedroom.
Crime scene investigator Joseph Restino showed the jury the section of carpet with red staining on the bottom. He testified that samples he took from the carpet tested positive for the presence of blood.
Investigators also removed the bathtub from the primary bathroom. Prosecutors showed the jury photos of what they said are blood stains seeping through the caulking and slightly pooling beneath the tub. Investigators said more blood was found inside the drain of the standing shower.
Jurors have not yet heard from the Department of Forensic Science as to if the suspected blood samples tested positive and, if so, whose blood they found throughout the bedroom and bathroom.
Naresh Bhatt’s defense attorney suggested that sloppy police work might have tainted the crime scene.
She said some officers investigating at the home weren’t wearing the proper PPE and one officer left trash in the Bhatts’ kitchen after eating a hot dog.
Toward the end of the day, jurors saw video of Naresh Bhatt buying knives at Walmart days before his wife’s disappearance.
A Walmart employee walked the court through the video of Bhatt purchasing the knives. Investigators said they were only able to locate one of the three knives at the home.
Prosecutors say photos of bedroom, bathroom are evidence of killing
Photos of blood stains, zip ties, knives and cleaning products were presented to the jury on Wednesday.
Crime scene investigator Andrea Feldman said that on August 21, 2024, the day before Naresh Bhatt’s arrest, Feldman took photos inside the Bhatts’ home, noting the bed in the primary bedroom appeared intentionally shifted and seemed too close to the walk-in closet entrance.
Then in the primary bathroom, Feldman photographed the bathtub and noticed a set of window blinds was missing.
“I took a very close look at both window sills and including the window panes, and I noticed what I thought to look like reddish brown stains on the window sill and the window panes,” Feldman said. “To me, I suspected that they were blood.”
Feldman said she then searched for the missing set of blinds and found them in the walk-in closet. They also appeared to have reddish brown stains that she swabbed for DNA, she said.
Evidence photos also show cleaning supplies on top and underneath the sink, which prosecutors claim Naresh Bhatt used to cover his tracks and clean up the crime scene.
Downstairs in the kitchen, a set of kitchen knives was taken into evidence.
Prosecutors said Naresh Bhatt bought a new set of knives just days before the alleged murder and some of them have never been found.
Detective testifies on blood evidence
On Tuesday, Prince William County Detective Claudia Ventura described when crime scene investigators used Bluestar in the Bhatts’ home. It’s a chemical applied to a physical surface that chemically reacts with blood and illuminates blue when lights are turned off.
Investigators applied Bluestar on the home’s floor and to the primary bedroom, primary bathroom and down a hallway, Ventura said.
“After you saw the application of this Bluestar liquid in the master bedroom, what, if anything, did you see next?” prosecutor Matthew Sweet asked.
“So, the lights were turned off, and the room lit up,” Ventura said.
Naresh Bhatt floated theory about MS-13 and wife’s disappearance
Ventura spoke about interviewing Naresh Bhatt three times in the family’s home amid an intense search for Mamta Bhatt.
Ventura asked Naresh Bhatt where he thought his wife could be.
He said he had heard people talking about the gang MS-13 in the area, which the detective said she thought was odd. No evidence suggested any link between Mamta Bhatt’s disappearance and MS-13.
In the Bhatts’ bedroom, Ventura said she noticed Lysol and cleaning products in the closet. The placement of the bed struck her as odd.
“This is another closet, and the bed headrest is on top of the frame of the closet,” she testified.
Prosecutors claim he moved the bed and other furniture to cover up blood-soaked carpet.
During the defense’s cross examination of Ventura, public defender Tracey Lenox hammered home that Naresh Bhatt opened up his home to police and answered every question they asked.
“Was there any point during, really, any of these three encounters with him that he declined to give you access to any part of the house?” Lenox asked.
“No,” Ventura replied.
Prosecutors said that while he was cooperative, his story repeatedly changed.
Mamta Bhatt never would have chosen to leave her baby, prosecutor says
During opening statements on Oct. 7, Sweet said the evidence includes a saw that Naresh Bhatt allegedly handed over to a landscaper who was working on a house in their neighborhood.
The landscaper took the saw to police after realizing Mamta Bhatt had disappeared, Sweet said. Investigators took samples from the saw, which matched Mamta Bhatt’s blood and DNA, he said.
Sweet has also said forensic evidence from the home, suspicious Google searches and Naresh Bhatt’s statements prove his guilt.
During his opening statement, Sweet said Mamta Bhatt would not have run off just weeks before her daughter’s first birthday.
Naresh Bhatt has maintained his innocence, pleading not guilty to first-degree murder, defiling a dead body and concealment of a dead body. He has changed attorneys over the past two years and tried to get his current public defender removed from his case as recently as last month.
News4 is covering the whole trial. Video cameras are allowed in the courtroom, but live broadcasting and livestreaming are not.
The Bhatts’ daughter, who is now 3 years old, is being cared for by relatives.
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