BATON ROUGE - In interviews with police after Sadie Roberts-Joseph was murdered, Ronn Bell denied killing her or even driving her car.

Bell is on trial for second-degree murder in the 2019 death of the 75-year-old civil rights activist. Authorities have said his DNA was on her body and in her car.

Prosecutors on Thursday showed jurors video of Bell's truck and Roberts-Joseph's car turning, one after the other, onto Goudchaux Street, where Bell rented a house from Roberts-Joseph.

Two hours later, only her car drove away. It didn't turn onto nearby Kaufman Street, where she lived.

Roberts-Joseph was later found dead in the trunk of that car, parked behind an abandoned house on North 20th Street.

Bell, who was $1,200 behind in his rent, quickly become a suspect.

Jurors saw recordings of detectives' interviewing Bell before and after his arrest.

Bell told them that he and Roberts-Joseph were on good terms in spite of his unpaid rent.

"She was going to be OK with me staying there," he said.

Angela Roberts-Machen, Roberts-Joseph's daughter and part-owner of the house, testified Thursday that a note, hand written by her mother, had Bell's name on it. It was about potentially evicting him.

Roberts-Machen also recalled her disbelief when she learned of her mother's death.

"I couldn't quite grasp what happened, she said. "That was my mother."

She had to take over her mother's rental properties and the Odell S. Williams Now and Then African-American History Museum her mother had helped to create. A window was broken at the museum and the door forced open by police during their investigation needed repair.

Jurors were also shown surveillance video of Roberts-Joseph's car being driven near where it was later found abandoned and a man walking near a seafood restaurant around the corner.

Bell told detectives he stopped at that restaurant to get a drink.

The trial is set to resume Friday. Bell's attorney Randy Dukes said in his opening statement that investigators rushed to judgment about Bell's guilt when they learned about the outstanding rent.

Bell faces life in prison if he is convicted of second-degree murder in Roberts-Joseph's death.