Closing arguments are under way today in the trial of a Kansas State University professor charged with murdering his ex-wife.

The day’s arguments began shortly before 10 a.m., when assistant Dist. Atty. Angela Wilson stood up to give a roughly one-hour summary of the prosecution’s case against 48-year-old linguistics expert Thomas E. Murray.

Prosecution describes Ross’ final moments Defense delivers closing statement

In front of a courtroom filled with spectators, Wilson pounded her fist on a table to demonstrate the repeated stabbing of Carmin D. Ross. She showed jurors a photo of Ross’ bloody and bruised neck next to photos of the injuries found on Murray’s hands.

She then displayed a poster board covered with more than a dozen hand-written phrases describing pieces of evidence from the trial– including Murray’s statements to neighbors and police, his changed alibi, and the injuries on his hands.

As Wilson summarized each piece of evidence, she used a red marker to circle the words describing it on the board, then drew an arrow pointing from it to the center of the board. In the center of the board were the words “Murray killed Carmin.”

“There is only one thing that explains all the evidence,” Wilson said.

When Wilson finished, defense attorney Bob Eye stood up and argued for a half-hour. He reminded jurors Murray has no burden to prove his innocence and warned them not to build “inferences piled on inferences.”

For example, Eye said, they shouldn’t infer that because no physical evidence was found, Murray destroyed it.

“There’s no evidence of Tom Murray having destroyed anything,” he said.

Eye said the prosecutors’ case falls well short of proof beyond a reasonable doubt.

“It raised suspicions. It raised hunches, but without the facts to back that up,” he said.

When court resumes at 1:30 p.m., defense attorney Pedro Irigonegaray will argue for about an hour and a half, and prosecutor Tom Bath will have about an hour to give the final statement by prosecutors.

Murray is charged with stabbing and beating Ross on Nov. 13, 2003, at her home northwest of Lawrence at 1860 E. 1150 Rd. Prosecutors allege he killed Ross out of rage created by a custody dispute involving the couple’s then-4-year-old daughter.