Steven Wright's lawyers say he was in the video store, but didn't kill Rene Sweeney

Lawyers for the man accused of stabbing Rene Sweeney to death in 1998 say he was in the video store that day, but didn't kill the 23-year-old Sudbury woman.

Defence lawyer Bryan Badali gave his opening statement at the second-degree murder trial at the Sudbury courthouse Thursday.

He addressed the jury, just minutes after Crown prosecutors told them thatDNA found under Rene Sweeney's fingernails and fingerprints in her blood in the store match Steven Wright, the 43-year-old on trial for her murder.

Assistant Crown Attorney Kevin Ludgatealso said during his opening statement that DNA found on a jacket and a pair of blood-soaked gloves discovered not far from the Adults Only Video storewhere Sweeney was found dead match members of Wright's family.

But Badali told the court that Wright doesn't dispute any of that evidence, saying he was in the video store on Jan. 27, 1998.

He said Wright plans to take the stand in his own defence and face cross-examination from the Crown, something he isn't required to do, to tell the jury"what he saw, what he did and why he left the scene."

Badalitold the jurythey will hear that Sweeney was speaking with a friend on the phone that morning at 11 a.m., around the same time an employee of a neighbouring store saw a "scruffy" man enter the video store, who he later identified as John Fetterly.

Fetterly was charged with Sweeney's murder a few weeks later, in February 1998, only to be released the following day, after, according to the Crown, police investigators changed their minds.

The defence says there was a 30 to 40 minute window between the phone call and the scruffy man entering the store and a couple who came into the store, finding a bloody murder scene and a man in glasses carrying a blue bag, who then ran through the parking lot toward Paris Street.

Badalisaid that Wright was an 18-year-old high school student, who did not know Sweeney and had "no apparent motive to do this horrible thing."

"The Crown will not answer question of why he was there or answer the question of what happened when he was there," Badalitold the court.

"What it's really about is who killed Renee Sweeney?"

"Everyone who exacts violence on a person has a first time," Ludgate told the jury during his opening statement, adding that it's often for reasons known only to the person choosing to be violent.

"Wright may attempt to point the finger elsewhere."

Ludgate said in his opening statement that an expert will testify that the DNA under Sweeney's fingernails was likely from her scratching someone, but Justice Robert Gordon later told the jury that the expert is also likely to testify that it could have gotten there in other ways.

Badalisaid one of those possible ways is someone trying to provide medical aid to Sweeney.

"She was young, she was bright," Ludgate said of Sweeney, a 23-year-old Laurentian University student who worked part-time at Adults Only Video on Paris Street.

"She had a world of opportunity ahead of her, all cut short."

On Thursday afternoon, the court heard testimony from Sweeney's co-worker Fred Nurmi.

He was working at the Adults Only Video store on Lasalle Blvd. that morning and spoke with Sweeney on the phone three times.

Nurmi recalled that she was complaining about her hand being sore and about how the high snowbanks on Paris Street made it hard to see oncoming traffic.

She called back to brag about getting an early sale that day and during the third call, around 11 a.m., Nurmi said Sweeney hang-upbecause a customer came into the south-end store.

Nurmi said he tried calling back later, but only got a busy signal. He remembered Sweeney as an "all-around sweet girl."

The court heard that $178.25 was taken from the store, along with three Puritan magazines and two sex toys.

Long-awaited murder trial

Thursday was the first chance for the public to hear why police zeroed in on Wright and arrested him in December 2018.

Some of the details of their case have been heard in court, in particularduring the three times Wright has attempted to be released on bail. But those hearings were covered by a publication ban.

"We can confidently say that we have the man believed to be responsible for Rene's murder in custody," Greater Sudbury Police Chief Paul Pedersen said in 2018 after the arrest.

"This horrific event rocked the community to its core then and is still very much part of our life today."

Policedid a fair amount of talking about the investigation in the years since Sweeney was stabbed some 30 times in the video store where she worked on Jan. 27, 1998.

Year after year,anniversary after anniversary, Sudbury police detectives stressed in media interviews that this was not a "cold case,"but also spoke about how it was frustrating that they couldn't find the killer.

Police did also talk a bit about the evidence they had, including the DNA under Sweeney's fingernails and the DNA on a jacket and pair of gardening gloves left in a wooded area not far from the Adults Only Video store on Paris Street.