"I'm very disappointed," said David Ray. "I don't feel that my father got justice today."

For so long, the family of Allen Ray Jenkins has been sitting there in the courtroom silently, stoically watching the retrial of the man they believe murdered their loved one.

Brother Charles Jenkins and his wife, Maxine, perched daily on their bleacher cushions. Sidney Jenkins, the other brother, slumped in a row behind.

And David Ray, the son, sat quietly, absorbing the scene.

Then, on Wednesday, the verdict was read: Not guilty on all counts.

Alan Gell was absolved of the murder of Allen Ray Jenkins. And a torrent of emotion poured out of a family that has believed in the state's case since prosecutors charged Gell with the shooting death in 1995.

Jenkins' brothers and son still believe Gell is guilty as sin.

"There wasn't no one else," Sidney said. "They got it right the first time."

Charles shook his head in disgust.

"The sad part is somebody else is going to get hurt," he said. "You can bet on that."

Ray practically seethed over Gell's release. "I don't see how the jury could've done this," he said. "I guess they'll have to live with their own consciences."

But Ray had only praise for the prosecutors, sent down from the attorney general's office in Raleigh to retry the case. Jim Coman, in particular, did a fine job, Ray said.

Ray laid the blame for the acquittal on The News & Observer, which published a series about the case in 2002 focusing on evidence of Gell's innocence that prosecutors had withheld at the first trial.

"You all worked mighty hard to make this happen," Ray told me. "Are you gonna work that hard to find who really did kill my dad?"

But of course, the jurors didn't base their decision on stories in the newspaper.

They relied on evidence, including some that jurors in the 1998 trial did not get to see.

I asked Jenkins' brothers about those elements of the case. About the witnesses who said they saw Allen Ray Jenkins alive after Alan Gell was out of town or in jail on another charge.

Sidney Jenkins said those witnesses, most of whom he's known his whole life, were well-intentioned but dead wrong.

"They didn't see him alive," he said. "They just made a mistake.

"I made a mistake at first myself. I thought I saw him alive after he was dead, too. But I changed it a week later."

As for the scientific evidence that also suggested Allen Ray Jenkins died after prosecutors said, the brothers scoffed.

They saw their brother's body after he was found.

"Somebody don't decompose that much in three days," Charles said. "We know. We had to go clean up that mess. It was horrible."

But what if Gell didn't commit the murder?

"Well, a man's dead and somebody's got to pay," Maxine Jenkins said.

But who will?

On that question, Ray and his uncles answered with resignation, and frustration:

No one.

No one will pay, Ray said.

There won't be new arrests. There won't be another trial.

"It's over," Ray said. "The whole thing is over."