Attorneys for a Jaffrey man accused of capital murder have moved to exclude multiple pieces of evidence and potential witnesses, including asking the prosecution to identify or exclude recorded jail cell calls and visits it intends to offer as evidence in the trial.

Armando Barron is accused of luring 25-year-old Jonathan Amerault of Keene to a secluded area in Rindge using his wife’s cellphone in in September 2020, beating him, enticing his wife to murder him by shooting him, standing on his neck and cutting his wrists before forcing Amerault into his own vehicle and shooting him multiple times.

His wife, Britany Barron, allegedly told police she and Amerault had been romantically involved, and the assaults and murder occurred after Barron found texts between the two on her phone, and she told him she wanted a divorce.

Armando Barron is also charged with multiple assaults on his wife prior to the murder, including threatening her with a gun and putting it in her mouth. His trial is scheduled to begin in May.

Britany Barron, pleaded guilty to falsifying evidence in the case, and was sentenced in October to 3 1/2 to seven years in prison. She admitted to being forced by her husband to participate in the assault on Amerault and attempting to cover up the murder in the aftermath.

According to court documents on file with the Cheshire Superior Court, Meredith Lugo and Morgan Taggart-Hampton, public defenders representing Barron, have filed multiple motions to exclude or limit evidence from multiple sources.

Since Barron’s arrest, he has been housed in the Cheshire County House of Correction, and his telephone calls and visits from people other than his attorneys have been recorded and provided to the attorney general’s office, resulting in thousands of sound and video files to sort through, and many of the calls were conducted in Spanish and must be translated, according to court documents.

“It is simply not feasible for defense counsel to review all of these recordings while simultaneously preparing for trial and managing their respective caseloads given the number of recordings and the timing of when they were provided, particularly when the defense has yet to receive translations of any of the recordings,” Lugo and Taggart-Hampton wrote in their motion. “This is especially true because typically in counsel’s experience, much of the content of the defendants’ recorded calls and visits are inadmissible for various reasons. Therefore, the defense is requesting that the Court order the State to identify the recordings it intends to use at trial within a reasonable amount of time prior to trial to allow for evidentiary challenges to be made and ruled on by the Court in a timely fashion.”

Lugo and Taggart-Hampton requested that the state either identify the recordings by April 1, as well as provide translations by the same date, or preclude the state from using any of the recordings at all.

Barron’s attorneys have also submitted a motion to exclude criminalist Emily Rice from the New Hampshire State Laboratory as an expert witness as it relates to footwear impressions on Amerault’s head.

During deposition, Rice testified that she examined photographs of the impressions and created test impressions of Barron’s shoes, and concluded that the outsole design and physical size of the shoe were consistent with the impressions, and could not be excluded as the source of the impressions, but also could not conclusively say it was indeed the shoe that made the impressions.

Lugo and Taggart-Hampton argue in their motion to exclude the testimony as “irrelevant” given that she had only reached “vague conclusions,” and that many shoes fit the same physical size and sole design.

The prosecution has also recently submitted several motions related to the evidence it hopes to present at trial, including evidence that Barron attempted to flee, demonstrating consciousness of his guilt.

In motions filed by New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella, on Monday, Sept. 21, Barron spoke to police regarding the welfare of his wife. He allegedly lied to police about dropping his wife off at Pack Mountain and then driving to Errol, N.H.

According to Formella’s motion, the following evening, after Amerault’s remains had been discovered at a campsite in Coos County, and Britany Barron had confessed to police, New Hampshire State Police Sgt. Stephen Sloper called and texted a cellphone belonging to Barron. Sloper told Barron the State Police and Jaffrey Police Department were trying to find Britany Barron, and asked him to meet with police.

Barron told police he was going camping with his daughters and was two hours away, and asked if he could meet investigators the next morning, but eventually agreed to return to Jaffrey and meet police at the Jaffrey Police Station within two hours. He did not arrive.

After issuing a be-on-the-lookout order for Barron, State Police officers located him driving north on Route 16, near Errol, a location between 3 ½ and four hours north of where Barron had agreed to meet police.

According to court documents filed by Formella, cellphone records indicate when Barron initially told police he was two hours away, he was actually in Concord, and that after speaking to police, he drove further north by several hours, in the opposite direction of Jaffrey. The state argued that by lying to and then avoiding police, Barron was showing consciousness of guilt.

The state has also moved to allow things said by Amerault just prior to his death, as reported to police by Britany Barron, as admissible. According to the motion, Britany Barron told police Amerault had begged for his life, told Armando Barron he would never see Britany Barron again and pleaded with her to use a machete against her husband.

The prosecution argued the statements are relevant in establishing who committed the crimes, and Barron’s state of mind as he was committing them.

The state has also requested to admit statements made by Barron to his wife, and that they should not be excluded due to marital privilege, including telling her that in Scripture, when a woman commits adultery, both her and the man she commits adultery with are supposed to be put to death and “as bad as he felt, he felt like he did what he was supposed to do.”

Ashley Saari can be reached at 603-924-7172 ext. 244 or asaari@ledgertranscript.com. She’s on Twitter @AshleySaariMLT.