Sexual assault trial goes to jury

By DOMINGO RAMIREZ JR.

STAR-TELEGRAM STAFF WRITER

FORT WORTH - A Tarrant County jury began deliberations Thursday morning in the felony trial of Jimmy Adams, who is accused of sexually assaulting several women at his North Richland Hills laser hair-removal center.

The jury of seven women and five men started deliberating about 9:50 a.m. in Criminal District Court No. 1. They had not reached a verdict after discussing the case for an hour.

Adams, 59, the owner of the center, is on trial on a single count of sexual assault. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in prison.

Mark Daniel of Fort Worth, Adams' attorney, told jurors in his closing arguments that the case had blatant inconsistencies.

"If you believe this had occurred, someone would have screamed. Someone would have stormed out of the room, but no one did," Daniel said. "His wife was 15 to 20 feet away. How could it occur with her so close?"

But prosecutors called Adams a predator who lulled customers into trusting him.

"Do you actually believe if this did not happen that these women would testify?" Tarrant County Assistant District Attorney Page Simpson asked jurors. "These women did not want to be confrontational when it happened, but it's taken a tremendous amount of courage to have testified."

Simpson said the testimony of at least four customers showed that what Adams did was not an accident or a mistake.

The women told police that they were sexually assaulted as Adams performed laser hair removal on their bikini lines.

In some cases, after a cosmetic procedure, Adams offered to do a laser hair removal on a bikini line for free, according to court documents.