SAN DIEGO — In their seventh day of deliberations, jurors in the David Westerfield case appear to be focusing on the time of Danielle van Dam's death, a key area of contention in the capital case.

The panel foreman sent a note to the judge Friday morning asking to rehear the testimony of medical examiner Brian Blackbourne and forensic entomologist David Faulkner.

Both men were present at Danielle's autopsy and their testimony sheds light on the defense's strongest argument for acquittal — that Danielle was murdered during a period when Westerfield has an airtight alibi.

Westerfield could face the death penalty if convicted of first-degree felony murder. Danielle, his neighbor, vanished from her bedroom last February. Her naked body was discovered in a trash-strewn lot 25 miles from her house nearly a month later.

Blackbourne testified early on in the two-month trial, June 5 and 6, that the 7-year-old's body was too badly decomposed to determine the cause of her death, nor to pinpoint when she died. He said she was killed sometime between Feb. 1, the night she vanished, and Feb. 18.

Faulkner, who studied the age of maggots plucked from Danielle's body, testified July 10 that the infestation of her body could have occurred as late as Feb. 16 to Feb. 18. Infestation usually happens within minutes to hours of a dead body being placed outside.

Forensic entomologist David Faulkner

Westerfield was under round-the-clock police surveillance after Feb. 4., and the defense argued he could not have killed Danielle if Faulkner's estimate was correct.

Testimony about the time of Danielle's death dominated the end of the trial. The defense called Faulkner, who was originally hired by the prosecution, and two other forensic entomologists who said insect colonization happened in mid-February.

Prosecutors called their own experts, a forensic entomologist and anthropologist, who attacked the defense experts' findings and said that weather conditions could have rapidly mummified the girl's tiny body, postponing insect activity for a week.

The court reporter will reread the testimony to the panel in the jury room. They will not be brought into open court.