Norman Clark mistrial: Jury deadlocked on Brittany Eldridge murder case

Norman Clark's retrial came to a close Friday, and a mistrial was declared after the jury could not reach a verdict in the Brittany Eldridge murder case.

The decision of whether or not the case will be tried again is now in the hands of the state.

The Knox County Criminal Court said the case has been put back on the docket for a status hearing in October, but could not provide further details.

Clark is accused of killing his estranged ex-girlfriend, Brittany Eldridge, and their unborn son, Zeke, in her northwest Knoxville apartment in December 2011.

He was retried this week after the jurors came back hopelessly deadlocked 11-1 in favor of a "not guilty" verdict in the case's initial August 2015 trial.

Eldridge's mother, Robin Owens, discovered her daughter naked on her bedroom floor with stab wounds on her neck and strangled to death in December 2011. The murder weapon is believed to be a pair of scissors.

Owens told authorities Clark was kind until he found out about Eldridge's pregnancy.

Clark's alibi was that he was watching TV at Leann Hawn's home the night Eldridge was killed. Hawn initially told investigators she fell asleep at 9:30 p.m. and woke up to Clark walking into her room at 10:30 p.m.

An agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation said he pinged Clark's phone in the general area of Eldridge's apartment at the times of 8:28 p.m., 8:29 p.m., and 9:05 p.m. In Clark's first trial, his attorneys did not have an alibi for the time period between 8:30 p.m. and 9 p.m.

After testing over 20 DNA samples, the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation released there is no DNA evidence linking Clark to Eldridge's murder.