CENTENNIAL, Colo. -- Did he beat Aarone to death?

Did he help Shely Lowe dispose of his little girl's body?

Is there enough evidence to convict Aaron Thompson on any or all of the 57 charges he faces?

Even after sitting through the entire trial, those are hard questions for this reporter to answer.

But that's the crucial role the jury now has to play in the highly anticipated Arapahoe County criminal trial.

Closing arguments were presented to the jury Tuesday and deliberations are under way in a room away from the now closed courtroom.

Reviewing notes taken over the past 27 days of testimony, these are some of the quotes that stick out. They may or may not have the same weight with the jury but should help give the reader a sense of how difficult it will be to sift through all this evidence and testimony.

"Yes, she's still breathing. But she acts like she passed out or something." This was Lowe, talking on the phone, according to the recollection of Lowe's aunt, Velma Jean Belizaire.

"Well, she was getting ready to get a spanking," is what Belizaire recalled Lowe telling her about the little girl in the Aurora home. "I sort of said it half-joking, 'Well, maybe that scared her,'" said Jean Belizaire of the panicked call she received from her niece, in the fall of 2003. The prosecution believes that Aarone died late summer or early fall of 2003.

"She said she wanted me to ride with her ... to Michigan so that she could find a spot for Aaron to say that's where Aarone had been kidnapped." This is Tabitha Graves on the witness stand.

She told the jury that Call 7 Investigator Tony Kovaleski's exclusive interview on Dec. 1, 2005 with Lowe and Thompson "pissed her off" to the point she agreed to serve as a confidential informant and secretly record numerous conversations and phone calls with her friend Shely Lowe.

"'Sometimes you just snap and then you deal with the consequences ... Sometimes the body's hidden so well it'll never be found.' And when I turned around he had a little smirk on his face."

This is convict Jessie Reynolds on the witness stand, describing statements he said he heard Thompson make in January of this year as both were housed at the Arapahoe County jail. His credibility has been attacked by the defense because Reynolds told the jury he was testifying because he wanted to, not in order to benefit to himself. But, that same day, Reynolds wrote a letter to prosecutor Bob Chappell, asking for $800 in reward money for his testimony.

"Just heard her crying then ... dead silence. (I) just heard Aarone getting spanked. I walked past the bathroom ... Aaron had a brush. (I) just wanted to see what was going on. That was the night and she was gone. That's all I know."

This statement comes from an 18-year-old who lived in the Thompson home. He is an adult now and already has criminal issues of his own. His credibility is another, major problem for the jury because he has also admitted lying about several outlandish statements, such as claiming Lowe and Thompson told him to get a knife and "finish her off," referring to Aarone.

"I'm stumped just like y'all is ... I didn't touch my child. All I know is she gone."

This is Thompson, talking to police during the police interview. During that interview when detectives left him alone, Thompson sighed and asked, "Aarone, where you at?"

"I don't want it to be swept under the rug ... She said that her and Aaron left the house at night and took Aarone. They dressed her up in her clothes and drove her far away and buried her and as they were burying her she could hear the last breath comin out of the child's body."

This is Eric Williams, Sr. on the witness stand Aug 12. He is the father of two of Lowe's five kids, and one of four fathers to those children. He talked about what Lowe told him about what happened to Aarone.

"Most of us lie. We don't tell the truth."

This is a recorded interview statement made by the oldest male child living in the East Kepner Place home in Aurora. He would go on to get a contempt of court charge for allegedly calling the judge a derogatory name in court.

"I tried to go the correct way. I tried to deal with it when it happened. It couldn't be dealt with."

This is Lowe's secretly recorded statement to friend and confidential informant in March 2006, just a few weeks before Lowe would die of a heart attack, the day after she confronted her friend about possibly helping police.

"Cause that's their punishment place. It was only them two."

This is the oldest girl in the home, talking about the use of the closet as a spot where Aarone and an older boy in the home were repeatedly placed -- sometimes overnight -- as punishment for things like wetting the bed. Aurora police built a wooden replica of the closet and wheeled it into the courtroom. A CBI expert on DNA would later tell the jury that while she couldn't find Aarone’s DNA in several places in the home, including her own bed. She did find it on the bottom door of that closet.

"In a real bastardization of 'just wait 'till your father gets home.'"

This is Judge Valeria Spencer explaining why she refused to dismiss the child abuse charges against Thompson, as requested by his public defenders.

"Make no mistake about it, that house was a torture chamber."

Prosecutor Amy Richards in her closing remarks late Tuesday afternoon.

"And there is no body ... They don't have a cause of death ... What is the evidence? That Mr. Thompson’s the principal? That he's the complicitor? That he’s an accessory? Was it an act of abuse? Was it a pattern of conduct? Was it placing Aarone in the situation? What are they saying he did that fits that crime? They’re not committing. They’re saying there are a bunch of possibilities…we’ll leave it to you to sort it all out ... And I know she’s gone (Aarone). And that is difficult and it's hard. But wrapping this all together with accusations and exaggerated tales of child abuse and the noble motive of trying to find her, reaching a verdict that is not supported by the evidence or the law is not justice.?"

This is Thompson's public defender, James Karbach, in his closing remarks Tuesday.