An elderly Arizona rancher was on trial for murder in recent weeks over a January 2023 incident in which an illegal migrant was found dead on his property hours after the property owner claimed to have fired warning shots at a group of armed trespassers.

That trial ended on Monday when the presiding judge declared a mistrial after the jury failed to reach a unanimous verdict following several days of deliberation, the New York Post reported.

It has not yet been determined whether Santa Cruz County prosecutors will attempt to retry George Alan Kelly, 75, on a second-degree murder charge and other counts related to the death of Mexican national Gabriel Cuen-Buitimea, 48, or if the charges will be dropped altogether.

Mistrial declared

CBS News reported that Superior Court Judge Thomas Fink told the court on Monday, "Based upon the jury's inability to reach a verdict on any count, this case is in mistrial."

Jurors began deliberating Thursday afternoon and continued through Friday and most of Monday before it became clear that they were deadlocked, not just on the second-degree murder charge but also on lesser charges of negligent homicide and reckless manslaughter.

Prosecutors are expected to inform the judge of their plans to either retry Kelly -- whether on the same or lesser charges -- or drop the matter altogether in a status hearing scheduled for next Monday.

One juror away from acquittal

Fox News reported that Kelly's defense attorneys revealed after the mistrial was declared that their client was nearly acquitted of the charges against him except for a single member of the eight-person jury who insisted on a conviction.

"The jury verdict was seven to acquit and one, lone holdout who was stubborn and would not listen to evidence," the defense team said. "All the other jurors were angry about it."

Upon leaving the courthouse following the courthouse, Kelly was asked by a reporter about the prospect of being tried for murder a second time, but replied, "They won't wear me down."

Nobody knows for sure what actually happened

According to ABC News, prosecutors alleged that Cuen-Buitimea, an illegal migrant who'd previously been deported, had entered the country illegally on the fateful day in January 2023 with a larger group of migrants but was unarmed and headed back to Mexico after the group scattered when spotted by U.S. Border Patrol agents.

It was further alleged that Kelly had fired multiple rounds from an AK-47 rifle toward Cuen-Buitimea from more than 100 yards away, striking and killing the victim, and then gave various conflicting accounts of what had occurred after law enforcement arrived on the scene and in subsequent interviews with detectives.

The prosecution further argued that Kelly had no justification for firing his rifle toward the illegal migrants who were ostensibly unarmed and headed back south toward the border with Mexico.

However, per the Post, the defense countered that Kelly had observed armed men wearing backpacks and camouflage on his property and fired warning shots into the air, only to discover Cuen-Buitimea's body several hours later. Notably, no bullet was recovered, and prosecutors were unable to rebut the defense team's theory that the victim was killed either by other members of the group or by a cartel-affiliated robbing crew.

Fox News noted that the defense also undermined the prosecution's case by alleging evidence of political bias and premature conclusions of guilt by the local sheriff and prosecutors against the elderly defendant, which led to a refusal to pursue other leads and an extraordinary effort by the sheriff to interview a supposed witness in Mexico who it was later revealed wasn't in the U.S. at the time of the incident.