Circuit Judge Brouck Jacobs spent 90 minutes Thursday listening to lawyers debate whether to admit nine hours of secretly recorded conversations between Joseph Elledge and his wife, Mengqi Ji, into evidence.
In the end, Jacobs said he would consider allowing the recordings into evidence and would make a decision after he had reviewed them.
Elledge’s first-degree murder trial is scheduled to begin Nov. 1 in Boone County Circuit Court. He was indicted by a grand jury in February 2020 in connection with the death of his wife.
Ji was reported missing Oct. 10, 2019, and her body was found March 25 in Rock Bridge Memorial State Park.
The nine hours of secret recordings include 12 audio files — two that Ji recorded and 10 that Elledge recorded. Sections of the audio recordings were transcribed and included in a 66-page trial brief released in May.
Scott Rosenblum, Elledge’s defense attorney, strongly encouraged Jacobs to listen to the unredacted version of the audio recordings before making his decision.
The recordings last a total of 13 hours, but Boone County Prosecuting Attorney Dan Knight has cut them down to the nine hours he wants admitted into evidence.
Knight said he would provide the full-length audio recordings for Jacobs to review, arguing that the recordings are “key evidence,” necessary to show motive for murder, context and consciousness of guilt.
An earlier Missourian article about the 66-page trial brief reported that Knight used partial transcripts of the recordings to describe Elledge as repeatedly threatening Ji and “gaslighting” her to gain control and manipulate her.
“Gaslighting is a form of persistent manipulation and brainwashing that causes the victim to doubt (herself), and to ultimately lose (her) sense of perception, identity and self-worth,” Knight wrote in the brief, citing a 2017 article in Psychology Today.
“Ultimately, the recordings prove that the defendant killed Mengqi because he hated her,” Knight wrote. “The recordings also prove that the defendant deliberated before he killed Mengqi.”
In the excerpts Knight took from the recordings, Elledge tells Ji she doesn’t know her own body, but he does. When Ji says she is still recovering after the difficult birth of their daughter, Elledge repeatedly tells her she’s fine. He tells Ji she was eating too much, even though she tells him she needs the food, as she was breastfeeding.
Elledge also repeatedly scolds Ji for failing to listen to him and to do as she’s told. In one of their recorded arguments, Elledge admits to holding back from hitting Ji.
Many of the arguments stem from Elledge insisting that he was “in charge of the household” and denigrating Ji’s Chinese culture.
The arguments also involve Ji’s relationship with her mother, Ke Ren. Elledge disliked having Ren stay at their home to take care of their baby and became upset when Ji would talk with her mother over the phone.
In the final recording — on Aug. 20, 2019 — Elledge declares his desire to divorce Ji and accuses her of abusing him.
“I don’t like being married to you. I don’t like living with you, anything with you,” he said. “It’s been a terrible relationship, and I’m eager to end it.”
In a May 19, 2019, conversation, Knight wrote, “the defendant issued a threat to Mengqi that he eventually followed through with when he warned her, ‘Next time you dig a hole just, just, I’m going to just let you jump in, and I’m going to bury the dirt over you.’”
On Thursday, Knight said the recordings are needed in a trial that is relying heavily on circumstantial evidence.
There will be a status hearing about the case Sept. 23.