Adams’ jury returns Wednesday to continue deliberations on his fate

YOUNGSTOWN — An eight-woman, four-man jury has been sequestered in a hotel overnight after deliberating for six hours without reaching a verdict as to what penalty Bennie Adams should face for the 1985 murder of Gina Tenney.

The jury will return to the Mahoning County Courthouse to resume deliberations at 9 a.m. Wednesday.

The jurors may recommend 25 years to life in prison, 30 to life, life without parole or a death sentence.

Judge Timothy E. Franken of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court is presiding over the case, in which the same jury convicted Adams last Wednesday of aggravated murder with a death penalty specification.

Tenney, a 19-year-old Youngstown State University student, who was Adams’ upstairs neighbor in an Ohio Avenue duplex, died by strangulation on Dec. 29, 1985. Her frozen body was found floating in the Mahoning River near West Avenue the following day.

Adams, 51, was indicted in the case last year after a DNA match was found in evidence police had preserved for 22 years.

For the complete story, see Wednesday’s Vindicator and Vindy.com.