A mistrial due to alleged juror misconduct was declared Wednesday afternoon near the end of closing statements in the first-degree murder trial of a local man involving a 2017 fatal shooting near a former nightclub.
The seven-woman, five-man Garland County Circuit Court jury had listened to three days of testimony in the trial of McKinley Junior Williams, 31, who could have faced up to life in prison if convicted in the July 16, 2017, death of Timothy Edmund Martin, 37, who was shot multiple times while sitting in his car near the former Boot Scooters, 421 Broadway St.
Both sides had rested shortly after 11 a.m. Wednesday and they were wrapping up closing statements when the court learned one of the jurors was acquainted with the victim, Martin, despite all of them being questioned repeatedly to make sure none of them knew the victim, suspect or any of the other principals involved in the case, Chief Deputy Prosecutor Kara Petro told The Sentinel-Record.
Petro said the juror was reportedly a former employer of the victim and didn't disclose that information to the court. The case will have to be reset for a new trial, likely in October.
Williams testified Wednesday morning, despite the fact jurors then learned he had two prior convictions in Chicago for robbery in 2006 and 2007 and a conviction in Garland County in 2009 for simultaneous possession of drugs and firearms for which he was sentenced to 25 years in prison. He served seven and a half years before he was paroled in September 2016.
Under questioning by his attorney, Chief Public Defender Tim Beckham, Williams presented a timeline of his activities on the night of July 15 and morning of July 16 before and after the shooting of Martin that differed significantly from a timeline laid out Tuesday by Hot Springs police Detective Scott Lampinen, the lead investigator on the case.
Kirkland Eugene Litzsey, 31, of Little Rock, had previously admitted to driving Williams to and from Boot Scooters before and after the shooting and to another club, Rumors, afterward, although he claimed he didn't know Williams planned to shoot Martin. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison on March 4 after pleading guilty to hindering apprehension or prosecution in the case and testified Tuesday as part of his plea agreement.
Using cellphone records from Williams' and Litzsey's phones and security video obtained from multiple businesses along the route, Lampinen had testified how investigators were able to place Williams in the area of Boot Scooters at the time of the shooting, which reportedly occurred at approximately 1:14 a.m.
Williams testified he was at a party some friends had thrown for him, since his 29th birthday was on July 15, at an apartment on Higdon Ferry from around 9:30 to 11:30 p.m. the night of the shooting. After a quick trip to the liquor store before it closed, he went riding around with a friend, Anthony Loudermill, who had been at the party.
He noted they drove past Boot Scooters and through downtown "just trying to see who was out and who was kicking it."
Williams said they went to Loudermill's sister's apartment on Whittington at one point so Loudermill could change clothing, while he waited in the car for him. When Loudermill came back to the car, Williams said he told him he had heard there was a shooting at Boot Scooters.
He said they then went back to the apartment on Higdon Ferry at around 1:30 a.m. to retrieve Williams' phone charger after his phone died. He said he had spoken to his friend, Litzsey, several times on the phone earlier and eventually met up with him on Charteroak Street because Williams wanted to go to Rumors and Loudermill was "fighting with his girlfriend" and needed to go see her.
He said he got out of Loudermill's car and into Litzsey's car and they went to Rumors, and that was the first time he was actually with Litzsey that night. He said he asked Litzsey if he knew about the shooting and Litzsey "told me somebody got killed but didn't go into detail."
Williams said they went to Rumors for an hour or so, noting he had wanted to go there because a rapper he liked was performing. He said he found out the rapper was having his after-party at Boot Scooters and wanted to go there. Litzsey didn't want to go at first, but he talked him into it, he said, and they stayed at Boot Scooters until it closed at around 5 a.m.
Williams said he saw Martin's car parked at Boot Scooters when they arrived and "there was a crime scene in front of the club," but never saw Martin that night and denied shooting him.
Asked by Petro how he knew what Martin's car looked like, he said he had seen him outside a local restaurant a few months earlier in the car and "would sometimes see him in traffic." He said he first met Martin when they were in jail together in 2009, before Williams went to prison.
"We weren't friends or anything, he was much older than me," he said. "He was not someone I was kicking it with. We didn't go to school together. He was not in my age group."
He denied having any problems with Martin, but noted, "He may have had a problem with me, but I don't know why."
Petro repeatedly questioned apparent inconsistencies in Williams' story, including how he was able to talk to Litzsey multiple times on the phone during the period from 12:52 to 2:08 a.m. when his phone was off, according to cellphone records. Williams said he used Loudermill's phone, which Petro noted he had never mentioned earlier.
Petro also noted security video at Rumors put him and Litzsey arriving there at 1:40 a.m., which was inconsistent with his timeline and would not have allowed enough time for all the activities he described leading up to it.
"I was not involved with anything (Litzsey) did," Williams said at one point. "I didn't have anything to do with it."
He said he was not sure about the exact times involved and told Petro, "You're trying to confuse me or make me seem conflicted." He also noted that "those phone pings" reportedly placing him at various locations "are not accurate."
An earlier defense witness, La'britanie Brewer, had testified Wednesday she was in the parking lot of Boot Scooters the night of the shooting and saw Deandre Collins, who was sitting in the car with Martin when he was shot, jump out and run up to the bouncers yelling for help.
She said she knew Martin because she had bought marijuana from him in the past. She said she approached Martin's car and asked if he was OK and when he didn't answer she called 911 thinking he was dead. She said she saw Collins go back to the car moments later and retrieve a black, rectangular bag, "like a barber bag."
Before Brewer testified, while the jury were out of the room, prosecutors had objected to her testimony, arguing it was not relevant whether Martin was a drug dealer or if the bag Collins grabbed had drugs in it.
Judge Marcia Hearnsberger questioned Beckham about it, noting Martin "was executed. There was no evidence it was a drug deal" and that there had been no earlier testimony laying the groundwork for that theory.
Beckham argued that it may have been a robbery, involving Litzsey or someone else collaborating with Collins to steal Martin's drugs. He said he wanted to establish an alternative theory of "a drug dealer taking out another drug dealer."
Hearnsberger noted the shooting "lasted six seconds" and the shooter immediately fled so there was no evidence of a drug deal or robbery. She finally relented and said she would allow Brewer to testify about previously buying marijuana from Martin, noting, "The jury is looking for why this happened."
Local on 07/18/2019