GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. – A Mesa County District Court judge declared a mistrial Friday in the murder trial of Lester Jones, who is accused in the 2007 kidnapping and murder of Paige Birgfield.

The decision came after four days of jury deliberations in the trial, which has been ongoing for several weeks.

The jury told the judge Friday morning they could not reach a unanimous decision in the case, and after the judge sent jurors back for further deliberations, they again could not come to a unanimous decision on first or second-degree murder and kidnapping charges.

The jury was split, with nine people finding Jones guilty, but three determining there was too much doubt to convict him.

District Attorney Daniel Rubinstein said he and the defense would go back to the judge Sept. 16 to reset a trial date.

Birgfield was a Grand Junction mother of three who secretly ran an escort service. She disappeared in June 2007 and her car was found burning in a Grand Junction parking lot days later.

Birgfield’s skeletal remains were found five years later in Delta County.

Police arrested Jones in December 2014 on murder and kidnapping charges, to which he pleaded not guilty. He was allegedly a client of Birgfield’s escort service, Models Inc.

He denied knowing Birgfield, though phone records connected the two and Jones worked across the street from where her car was found.

ABC News will feature a special report on the case Friday evening.

DENVER – A South Carolina man previously convicted of sex offenses pleaded guilty Thursday to using fake Facebook profiles to trick six teenaged Colorado girls to send him explicit photos of themselves.

Christopher George White, 37, of McCormick, South Carolina, pleaded guilty to six counts of coercion and enticement of a minor in U.S. District Court Thursday.

He faces at least 10 years and up to life in prison, as well as a $250,000 fine, for each count.

The crimes happened over about a week during the summer of 2014. The plea agreement says White targeted girls aged 13 and 14 and used a fake Facebook profile to convince the girls he was a teen boy.

The convicted sex offender originally contacted the girls on Facebook, then talked with them through text messages and over the phone. Prosecutors say White would threaten the girls with violence or to send their explicit photos to their friends on social media if they did not send more photos.

Prosecutors say he used the fake names of “Kent Noelle” and “Glenn Black” to contact the girls and that he may have more victims. Anyone who believes they or their child was a victim is asked to call Homeland Security Investigations at 866-347-2423.

White is scheduled to be sentenced Dec. 14.

DENVER – A burglar was literally caught red-handed after he left a trail of paint from the convenience store he broke into back to his home.

A newly-unsealed search warrant show Daniel Cline, 37, made off with quite the haul when he burglarized the Mexicana Mart on West Alameda Avenue in late July.

After he broke into the store through a window air conditioning unit, he allegedly stole two laptops, cartons of cigarettes, pipes, an internet router, blunt wraps and a cordless drill, among other items.

But he apparently failed notice he had knocked over a can of bright red paint that had been sitting atop the air conditioning unit and had gotten it all over himself while rifling through the store.

A responding Denver Police Department officer noticed a trail of red footprints leading back out of the business and followed them down a nearby alley to a home in the 1500 block of West Alameda.

The officer noted in an affidavit for Cline’s arrest that there was red paint on a door jamb at the house and on its floor.

A back door was open, so the officer went inside and found Cline asleep inside with red paint on his arms, hands and socks.

Police confirmed Cline was the same man seen burglarizing the convenience store on surveillance video and charged him with second-degree burglary. He is due in court on the charge Sept. 26.

DENVER – A man kidnapped from a Lakewood sex store at gunpoint was returned to his family days later after they paid $200,000 in ransom money, and at least three people now face charges in the plot.

The kidnapping happened Aug. 30 at Chrystal’s in Lakewood and was followed by days of negotiations with the victim’s father. Ransom demands started at $500,000, and the kidnappers eventually received $200,000 in cash before local and federal authorities foiled the plan.

Andres Flores-Paredes, 27, was snatched from the adult store by several men wearing bulletproof vests and armed with assault rifles and grenades, among other weapons. The suspects had originally tried to kidnap his brother in a plan that had been in the making for months or even years, according to court documents.

Suspects were acquaintances of family of kidnapped man

Three people have already been arrested in the case and a fourth faces charges but has not been arrested.

One of the men allegedly involved in planning and carrying out the ordeal is still at large. Marco Antonio Cota-Tamaura, 36, “had a major conflict” regarding the horse industry and Flores-Paredes’s father, Andres Flores-Zapata, who runs a ranch near Commerce City.

Two brothers arrested in the plot – Raymundo Maldonado-Salgado, 22, and Jonatan Maldonado-Salgado, 19 – each knew the family as well, according to the documents. A third man, Hernando Aguilar-Banuelos, 30, has also been arrested for his alleged involvement.

After the initial kidnapping, court records say the men drove Flores-Paredes to different stash houses in Weld and Adams counties, where they repeatedly called Flores-Zapata to demand money, lest they kill his son.

Agents found suspects by tracing cell phones, addresses

The day after the kidnapping, Flores-Paredes’s car and phone were dropped back off at the family ranch. The demands continually decreased, but Flores-Zapata eventually agreed with the kidnappers to pay the $200,000 in ransom money, which would be dropped on the side of the road at an exit off I-70 near Bennett.

Meanwhile, authorities were tracing the cell phones being used by the suspects to make demands and communicate amongst themselves. DNA found on zip-ties recovered from the sex shop was traced to Cota Tamaura.

Jonatan Maldonado-Salgado was eventually identified as one of the suspects when his phone number led authorities to his Facebook page. A photo on that page showed him wearing the same hat he wore during the initial kidnapping, which was caught on surveillance cameras.

When the money was first dropped at the I-70 exit on Sept. 2, the suspects could not find it. Angry, they called Flores-Zapata – who was working with FBI agents – and agreed that the money be dropped at the front gate of the family ranch instead.

After picking up the money, an affidavit says the suspects drove to the Adams County home they used to hide Flores-Paredes in order to check the money for bugs or false bills. They then returned Flores-Paredes to his family’s ranch around 2 a.m. Sept. 3.

Lakewood Police picked Flores-Paredes up to interview him. He recounted his kidnapping, but was kept hooded and in the two separate places and did not know much else. He told detectives he overheard one of the suspects talked about coming from California “to do this job” and that the man used eight phones for the job.

After connecting cell phone records and traces to the suspects’ addresses, authorities served warrants at several of the suspects’ homes, bringing in the Maldonado-Salgado brothers at a home in Fort Lupton.

Aguilar-Banuelos allegedly stayed at the Adams County home before and after Flores-Paredes’s kidnapping, and knew of the plot despite his initial statements he knew nothing. Authorities discovered he was taken to a hotel for the three days Flores-Paredes was kept at the home, though agents say his story continually changed.

All three men allegedly admitted to kidnapping Flores-Paredes and being involved in extorting his family and face first-degree kidnapping charges.

Raymundo Maldonado-Salgado also faces felony menacing and criminal extortion charges. It is unclear exactly what charges the other two face.

Some of the $200,000 in ransom money put up by the family has been recovered, but not all of it.

Authorities said at a Wednesday news conference regarding the case that Cota-Tamaura should be considered armed and dangerous. Denver Crime Stoppers is offering a $5,000 reward for information leading to his arrest. Call 720-913-STOP with tips.

AURORA, Colo. – A man who pleaded guilty to brutally attacking a woman at an Aurora motel in 2014 will spend 45 years in prison, an Adams County judge ruled Tuesday.

Jamal Michael Miles, 29, pleaded guilty to attempted first-degree murder and attempted sexual assault in the case in July.

Miles had been in the woman’s room at the Pacesetter Motel in March 2014 when he took issue with her asking him to leave.

Miles strangled and stabbed the woman, then slit her throat, raped her and tried to drown her in the motel’s bathtub. He then dragged her into a nearby ditch before a passerby intervened.

“This 45-year sentence means that this defendant will never hurt another member of our community,” Adams County District Attorney Dave Young said.

The woman suffered a fractured skull and deep cuts to her head, neck and hands in the incident, but survived.

A victim statement wasn’t available.

DENVER – Three of the motorcyclists accused of blocking off traffic on I-25 near University Boulevard in late July have been arrested and two of their motorcycles seized.

Richard Patton, 33, and Clinton Hawkins, 27, both of Colorado Springs, are being held for investigation on reckless driving and exhibition of speed warrants and are expected to be extradited to Denver to face charges.

Both of their motorcycles have been impounded, Denver Police said Tuesday.

Ryan Easton, 29, of Pueblo, also faces the same misdemeanor traffic charges and will likely be extradited to Denver as well.

Police issued an alert days after the incident in hopes of identifying some of the hundreds of bikers who took part in the “Kill da Streetz” ride, which stopped traffic on the interstate as the bikers performed wheelies and donuts in the middle of the road.

“People look at it and went, ‘what a stupid thing to do,'” said Bob Frank, owner of Black Bag who has been a safety rider coach for 15 years.

Police said videos posted on social media helped them crack the case and lead to the arrests.

“Ultimately, searching records for license plate numbers,” said Lt. Robert Rock with the Denver Police Traffic Investigation Unit. “The risk is extreme. When you are doing stuff like this on a highway, there’s no other place where people are driving faster.”

Rock said the rider’s motorcycles could now be impounded for a year or even crushed.

“It’s one of those things they say the chickens come home to roost. I don’t think they were planning on it happening when they did the civil disobedience that they did,” said Frank.

The group has said the event originated in an attempt to raise awareness for biker safety, but Frank said that message got lost in all the chaos.

“It’s a bigger issue. We’ve had more fatalities in Colorado than ever,” he said. “It’s the wrong way to call attention to that issue.”

DENVER – The City of Denver will add more mental and behavioral health professionals to its crisis response team to help people during interactions with police.

Six mental health professionals will respond with police when officers are called to handle situations involving people in crisis.

The team’s chief purpose is to reduce the number of people with mental health issues in the jail system, according to the city.

It also aims to lessen the cost of emergency services to those in crisis who may not be able to afford extensive care.

The program was first implemented as a pilot in April, with three co-responders on staff. In the first three months of the program, those workers went to 427 calls and helped get 408 people into treatment or stabilized.

The co-responders are part of the city’s Crisis Intervention and Response Unit, and the program is a partnership between Denver’s Office of Behavioral Health Strategies, the Denver Police Department and the Mental Health Center of Denver.

“The co-responder program is an important step in supporting those experiencing a mental health issue in the community,” Carl Clark, MD, president and CEO of the Mental Health Center of Denver, said in a statement.  “By having one of our licensed mental health professionals respond with law enforcement, we are able to provide earlier identification and intervention to those who are in a crisis situation and get them access to treatment and resources that can have a positive impact on their lives.”

DENVER — The man shot dead by Denver Police officers Wednesday had several outstanding warrants and was on supervised probation for being a sex offender.

The Denver Office of the Medical Examiner identified Michael Ferguson, 20, as the suspect killed Wednesday after he tried to get into a stolen vehicle, then an officer’s vehicle. At some point soon after, he struggled for one of the officer’s weapons and police opened fire.

Ferguson died when police shot him in the 2600 block of West Bates around noon Wednesday.

Three DPD officers involved in the struggle were also injured but were not shot.

Ferguson had active warrants stemming from a car theft case from May 2015 and a careless driving charge from June of this year. He failed to appear in court Monday on the latest case and was also wanted for violating his probation in the theft case.

During the theft case, a judge ordered him to be put on Sex Offender Intensive Supervision Probation, though it is still unclear exactly why.

He served time in the Colorado Division of Youth Corrections system from an unknown charge that happened when he was 14.