A Denver jury has convicted Jeffrey Sloan of killing the son-in-law of Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers and an Iraqi refugee when he sped through a red light at 61 miles per hour last summer at a major intersection.

During a nearly weeklong trial, prosecutors from the 18th Judicial District pointed to circumstances that painted Sloan as the driver of the stolen Jeep that slammed into the victims’ car in the early morning hours of June 9, 2019, despite incomplete evidence from eyewitnesses and video that would have definitively identified Sloan.

“The person who blew through a red light fleeing law enforcement, the person who blew through that intersection and blew through those two lives has been with us in this courtroom the whole time,” said District Attorney George Brauchler during closing arguments. “He’s seated right over there. His name is Jeffery Dean Sloan.”

Brauchler and his deputy, Brian Sugioka, tried the case in Denver District Court because of circumstances specific to the case. One of the victims, Mark Karla, was married to Alison Suthers, who is a prosecutor in the Denver District Attorney’s Office.

Karla, 45, was a dentist and the son-in-law of John Suthers. He had attended a Garth Brooks concert the night of the crash, and died from his injuries several weeks after the accident. He and Alison Suthers had a two-year-old daughter, Isabelle.

An electrical engineering student in Iraq, Yasir Hasan, 33, was driving for Uber when he picked up Karla. He came to the United States in 2012 following al Qaida and ISIS death threats against his family because of his brother’s work as a translator in the Iraqi military. Hasan’s family said that he became engaged shortly before he died.

“He was so friendly and helpful to anyone that needed help,” they wrote in a statement. “He came to the USA for a better life, for a better future and to live safely.”

The jury’s verdict convicted Sloan of assault in the first degree, vehicular homicide and failure to fulfill duties after involvement in an accident involving death, with separate charges for each of the two victims. John Suthers and his wife, Janet, were present during the trial.

“We are pleased that the person who acted so recklessly and caused the death of two innocent people will be held accountable,” he said on Tuesday. “Dr. Mark Karla was a terrific man, a great dentist, husband and father. Nothing will heal the wound to our heart and soul from our loss, but we will do all we can to ensure that our daughter and granddaughter have all the support they need to move forward.”

Representing Sloan, 37, were Victoria Eidsmo and Sonja Prins with the public defender’s office. During her closing argument to the jury on Monday, Eidsmo advanced a theory that prosecutors had charged the wrong man.

“We do not have to come up with the real driver. That is not our job,” she told the jury. “Do not let them confuse you because of the lack of evidence they’ve presented in this case.”

Eidsmo suggested an alternative explanation for the events of June 9: that Sloan had been making a drug deal when another man hopped into the stolen Jeep and took off. It was this second man who plowed into Karla and Hasan, leaving Sloan to take the fall because his jacket, identification, phone and DNA were still in the Jeep.

“Do not conflate the idea that his phone was there with the presumption that he was there,” she said. Earlier in the day, an analyst testified that another person’s DNA was found in the Jeep in addition to Sloan’s. And last week, Eidsmo questioned a Denver detective about why she did not conduct a more thorough search for video footage of the perpetrator from nearby National Jewish Health and the Regional Transportation District’s buses.

“This is a lack of investigation, a lack of evidence and an easy way out. And this is not proof beyond a reasonable doubt,” she concluded for the jury.

Brauchler countered that it was unlikely that someone other than Sloan was the perpetrator.

“There is no one else this could be. You would have to origami your brain to come up with an explanation for all of this evidence,” he said.

The prosecutors referenced the fact that there were text messages and calls from Sloan’s cell phone in the hours and minutes leading up to the crash. The phone was password-protected and the person using it was conversing with the woman with whom Sloan was in a relationship.

“Folks, either that cell phone that belongs to this guy is being operated by [Sloan] as he’s fleeing the police in that stolen Jeep Liberty, or he is the unluckiest man on the planet Earth because someone else that has that car and his phone knows [the woman] well enough to call her and text her repeatedly,” Brauchler argued.

Eidsmo observed that failing to call the woman to testify was another shortcoming of the prosecution.

The case is People v. Sloan.

This story has been updated with comments from John Suthers.