'She's in a better place than she was; I hope the same for everybody else involved'

Timothy Verrill, center, is accused of killing Christine Sullivan, left, and Jenna Pellegrini (Courtesy photos)

DOVER - Today marks the second day of jury selection at Strafford Superior Court where Timothy Verrill, formerly of Belknap Street, Dover, will be tried for the second time following a 2019 mistrial.
Opening arguments could come as soon as Tuesday, according to Assistant Attorney General Peter Hinckley, the lead prosecutor in the case.
But Jeff Sullivan, the brother of Christine Sullivan, one of the women slain on Jan. 27, 2017, said he's moving on and has no interest in attending or even reading about the retrial.
"I don't care, I'm at peace," he told The Rochester Voice on Tuesday. "She's in a much better place than she was, and I hope the same for everybody else involved."
Verrill, 41, is charged in the killings of Christine Sullivan, 48, who split her time between southwest Florida and Farmington; and Jenna Pellegrini, 32, of Barrington. Both were both found dead of multiple stab wounds, according to a coroner's report.
When Farmington Police arrived at the Meaderboro Road home owned by convicted drug dealer Dean Smoronk in the early morning hours of Jan. 29, 2017, they found the bodies of the two women under a tarp beneath outdoor stairs that led to a second-floor deck.
Smoronk, who made the call to police that night after returning from Florida to check on Sullivan, did so after seeing blood splatter at the residence, he said.
It was later determined that the women died two days earlier, on Jan. 27, 2017.
Before Smoronk called police he admitted to reviewing surveillance footage from his home security system, which is now part of voluminous evidence files that numbers in the tens of thousands of listed items.
The trial is expected to go as long as five weeks.
Meanwhile, the prosecution filed an affidavit last month indicating they are unable to contact a key witness, Vanessa Mango, who was a girlfriend of Smoronk at the time of the women's deaths.
Mango testified at the first trial that she dated Smoronk from 2014-2018 during when he was still in a relationship with Sullivan, and that he spent "about 90 percent" of his time in Florida at his Cape Coral condominium.
She testified that in the weeks and months leading up to the killings, Smoronk had grown increasingly frustrated with Sullivan's activities at his home, including increased outsiders visiting her as well as a home business she ran selling items online that he felt cluttered up the house.
Mango, of Fort Myers, Fla., said she got a message from Smoronk soon after he returned home - but before authorities discovered the bodies - that said, "It's very sad. A double homicide of two unsuspecting women."
Mango was a key witness for the prosecution because she placed Smoronk in Florida at the time of the deaths of Sullivan and Pellegrini.
During the first trial the defense painted Smoronk as an alternative suspect in the killings.
The prosecution lost another witness when Steven Clough died in a motorcycle accident in Arizona last August.
Verrill's defense team argues that Clough's previous testimony should not be allowed as they won't be able to cross-examine him. That issue is not yet settled, according to court documents.
The investigation into the slayings involves numerous witnesses at the house around the time of the murders, some of whom are suspected to have been involved in drug operations headed by Smoronk and Sullivan.
With so many different people in an out of the Meaderboro Road residence prior to the killings, Jeff Sullivan, who lives in New Jersey, believes a jury may find it difficult to pin the double murder on any one person.
"This (the retrial) is definitely painful," he said. "We almost had it out of our minds, we think about her everyday, but I don't think there's going to be any justice. There were too many people involved. To pin it all on one person, it just doesn't matter; it's not going to change anything."
Smoronk has never been mentioned as a suspect by prosecutors. He was listed as both a prosecution and defense witness in the 2019 trial. Hinckley told The Voice on Tuesday he would not reveal whether Smoronk would be a prosecution witness or not.
Smoronk pleaded guilty to trafficking meth in September 2019 and was sentenced to 42 months by the U.S. District Court for the state of New Hampshire.
He was released from a Residential Re-entry Management center in Philadelphia around Jan. 9, 2021.
Verrill remains held at the Carroll County House of Corrections. He faces life in prison without parole if found guilty. He has been incarcerated since Feb. 6, 2017, when he was arrested as a fugitive from justice in Massachusetts.