For the third straight day, the San Diego man accused of killing his estranged wife and her friend was on the stand testifying in his own defense. NBC 7’s Dana Williams reports on May 23, 2024.
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Closing arguments are scheduled Friday in the trial of a man charged with murdering his wife and another man by shooting them inside the couple's East Village apartment.
Ali Abulaban, 32, who was known in online circles as a content creator dubbed JinnKid, faces life in prison without the possibility of parole if convicted of the Oct. 21, 2021, slayings of Ana Abulaban, 28, and Rayburn Cardenas Barron, 29.
The case of the TikToker who killed his wife and her friend
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Prosecutors allege Abulaban killed both victims because he was angered that his wife no longer wanted to remain married to him.
Deputy District Attorney Taren Brast told jurors that Ana made it clear she was through with Abulaban following multiple incidents of domestic violence and Abulaban's sexual encounter with another woman.
While Abulaban testified that his wife may have hurled empty threats of divorce out of anger and wasn't clear whether they might reconcile, Brast argued Ana's position was obvious.
"I want you out of my life, once and for all," she texted Abulaban hours before she was killed.
Abulaban testified that he did not have sex with the other woman, but Ana had told others that he had cheated.
On the day of the shooting, Abulaban said he sought to catch Ana in the act with another man to prove "she's doing the same things she's accusing me of doing."
After hearing Ana and Barron in the apartment via an app he activated on his daughter's iPad, Abulaban sped over to confront them, he said.
Upon opening the front door to the unit, Abulaban testified that he was startled to see his wife with Barron, "snapped," and began shooting without any control over his faculties.
"I couldn't take the [expletive] betrayal," Abulaban testified through tears on Wednesday, stating that the next thing he knew, "I'm shooting and I can't stop."
Abulaban's defense case, which included nearly three full days of his testimony, detailed his mental health struggles, childhood trauma from alleged abuse, and mounting cocaine addiction, all of which the defense alleges played a role in his mindset before and during the shooting.
Abulaban testified that after moving to San Diego in early 2021, a rift formed between he and his wife due in part to a drug-fueled partying lifestyle they embraced with Ana's friends, which included Barron.
He testified that the presence of her friends started "bleeding into my marriage and it started changing Ana."
Abulaban said his undiagnosed mental health issues and a drug habit that escalated to daily use only made his handling of their marital problems worse.
Brast told jurors earlier in the trial that Abulaban was "jealous, controlling and violent," and had been physically and emotionally abusive towards his wife throughout their marriage.
Abulaban conceded that he had punched and pushed his wife on prior occasions in the months leading up to the shooting. He also admitted that he urged her against contacting the police or seeking a restraining order in connection with those incidents.
After the shooting, Abulaban called his mother, father, and a friend to confess and sent them a photograph he took of the victims' bodies.
He later called 911, telling a dispatcher that he found the victims dead.
Abulaban then picked up his 5-year-old daughter from her school and shortly before being arrested, told her, "I hurt Mommy," he testified.
