Miss-Delectable
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FORT WORTH - Jurors in Reginald Lynn Davis' capital murder trial Thursday heard more sparring among attorneys than testimony about the slaying of a deaf man during a botched robbery in southeast Fort Worth.
While both sides scored points, mostly in rulings by state District Judge Everett Young, the jury will get the final say when it gets the case today after closing arguments in 297th District Court.
Defense attorneys Reagan Wynn and Jeff Stewart won round one by persuading Young not to admit two statements Davis gave Fort Worth homicide Detective John McCaskill about a week after he told police he had witnessed the June 24, 2002, killing of 53-year-old Luis Marquez.
In the inadmissible oral statements, Davis, 39, told McCaskill the street name of the man he said shot Marquez during a struggle. Davis told a friend he earlier had withheld the name because he feared retaliation, McCaskill testified outside the presence of the jury.
McCaskill was allowed to tell the jury that Davis accompanied him to a carwash to point out the shooter and his blue car, but neither was ever found.
Young initially sided with prosecutors Stan Hatcher and Sean Colston, ordering the defense not to question McCaskill about other witnesses who might have told police about seeing a blue car at the shooting scene.
But Stewart later managed to get McCaskill to admit that he had questioned two witnesses who were with star prosecution witness Gary Gentry, who identified Davis as Marquez's killer. Defense attorneys told Young they have been unable to locate those witnesses to testify.
In an effort to discredit Gentry on Wednesday, the defense repeatedly contended that his earlier statements to police were inconsistent with his courtroom testimony.
Thursday, over defense objections, prosecutors persuaded Young to allow them to introduce Gentry's July 9, 2002, written statement and his July 10, 2002, tape-recorded statement to McCaskill.
Allowed to cross-examine Gentry again, Stewart again hammered Gentry about inconsistencies in those statements. But Gentry, clad in a red jail jumpsuit and wearing reading glasses, stubbornly insisted that he was not lying.
"What's on the tape is true. I got confused [in court] . ... I'm telling you the truth on the tape," he repeatedly said in response to Stewart's questions.
In other testimony, Fort Worth firearms examiner Ron Fazio said two T-shirts worn by Marquez had a bullet hole in the upper left chest area made by a .25-caliber bullet fired no more than 12 inches away.
Two .25-caliber shell casings were recovered at the crime scene, and a .25-caliber bullet was recovered from Marquez's body, but a weapon was never recovered.
While both sides scored points, mostly in rulings by state District Judge Everett Young, the jury will get the final say when it gets the case today after closing arguments in 297th District Court.
Defense attorneys Reagan Wynn and Jeff Stewart won round one by persuading Young not to admit two statements Davis gave Fort Worth homicide Detective John McCaskill about a week after he told police he had witnessed the June 24, 2002, killing of 53-year-old Luis Marquez.
In the inadmissible oral statements, Davis, 39, told McCaskill the street name of the man he said shot Marquez during a struggle. Davis told a friend he earlier had withheld the name because he feared retaliation, McCaskill testified outside the presence of the jury.
McCaskill was allowed to tell the jury that Davis accompanied him to a carwash to point out the shooter and his blue car, but neither was ever found.
Young initially sided with prosecutors Stan Hatcher and Sean Colston, ordering the defense not to question McCaskill about other witnesses who might have told police about seeing a blue car at the shooting scene.
But Stewart later managed to get McCaskill to admit that he had questioned two witnesses who were with star prosecution witness Gary Gentry, who identified Davis as Marquez's killer. Defense attorneys told Young they have been unable to locate those witnesses to testify.
In an effort to discredit Gentry on Wednesday, the defense repeatedly contended that his earlier statements to police were inconsistent with his courtroom testimony.
Thursday, over defense objections, prosecutors persuaded Young to allow them to introduce Gentry's July 9, 2002, written statement and his July 10, 2002, tape-recorded statement to McCaskill.
Allowed to cross-examine Gentry again, Stewart again hammered Gentry about inconsistencies in those statements. But Gentry, clad in a red jail jumpsuit and wearing reading glasses, stubbornly insisted that he was not lying.
"What's on the tape is true. I got confused [in court] . ... I'm telling you the truth on the tape," he repeatedly said in response to Stewart's questions.
In other testimony, Fort Worth firearms examiner Ron Fazio said two T-shirts worn by Marquez had a bullet hole in the upper left chest area made by a .25-caliber bullet fired no more than 12 inches away.
Two .25-caliber shell casings were recovered at the crime scene, and a .25-caliber bullet was recovered from Marquez's body, but a weapon was never recovered.
