Mallard pleads not guilty to murder - smoked pot, took ecstasy and drank heavily before hit and run

The Dallas Morning News ^ | June 23, 2003 | From Staff and Wire Reports

[MeekOneGOP]

Mallard pleads not guilty to murder

06/23/2003

From Staff and Wire Reports

FORT WORTH, Texas - A former nurse's aide smoked pot, took ecstasy and drank heavily in the hours before she hit a homeless man and drove home while he was lodged in her windshield, prosecutors and defense attorneys told jurors as her murder trial began Monday.

Chante Jawan Mallard, 27, faces life in prison if convicted. She pleaded guilty to a lesser charge, tampering with evidence, before attorneys began their opening statements on the murder charge.

Although she had taken drugs, Mallard could have stopped at a nearby fire or police station or called an ambulance after she hit Gregory Biggs on a highway in the early hours of Oct. 26, 2001, prosecutor Christy Jack said.

Michael Ainsworth / DMN

A sheriff's deputy escorts Chante Mallard into the courtroom on the first day of her murder trial at the 371st District Court at the Tarrant County Justice Center.

"All of a sudden -- bam -- he was just there," Mallard said in a statement to police, which Jack read to jurors.

Mallard did stop briefly to try and get Biggs off her car, but when she couldn't, she drove about a mile to her home, Jack said. Mallard then called one of her friends to pick her up, Jack said.

She and her friend then went to find Mallard's ex-boyfriend to figure out what to do next. When they couldn't find him, they went back to the house, where Mallard took the friend into the garage, Jack said. By that time, Biggs was dead, still lodged and bleeding in the jagged windshield.

The friend told Mallard to call 911, Jack said.

"Chante refused because she didn't want her parents to know what she'd done and didn't want to go to jail," Jack said.

Defense attorney Jeff Kearney said Mallard was in a drug-induced haze and had been hit in the face with flying glass when the car hit Biggs. He said she doesn't dispute what happened, but it was an accident, not murder.

She was just one exit from her home, so she kept driving with "a body entirely in her car, the head in the floorboard, legs going in directions that no one thought humanely possible. You can't imagine," Kearney said.

He said after Mallard pulled into her garage and lowered the door, she sat in the car and cried, repeatedly apologizing to Biggs, who was moaning.

When the friend arrived at the house, Mallard was hysterical and "was blabbing, 'Lord, I'm sorry. What do I do? Lord, I'm sorry. It was an accident. What do it do?"' Kearney said.

Biggs, 37, a former bricklayer who had been living in a homeless shelter, was found dead the next day, his body dumped in a park.

When pictures of Biggs' twisted, bruised and bloody body were shown Monday on a large screen in the courtroom, Mallard looked down, and some jurors grimaced or looked away. Biggs' relatives were not in the room when the photos were displayed.

Mallard's attorney said Clete Jackson, one of two men who pleaded guilty to helping dump Biggs' body, orchestrated moving Biggs to Cobb Park.

Jackson received a 10-year sentence for tampering with evidence. His cousin, Herbert Tyrone Cleveland, received nine years. As part of plea agreements, they were to testify at Mallard's trial.

Police initially said Biggs lived for several days in Mallard's garage, slowly bleeding to death from his multiple fractures and cuts.

But Tarrant County Medical Examiner Nizam Peerwani later said Biggs, whose left leg was nearly amputated, probably lived only a few hours after he was hit. He could have survived if he had received medical attention, Peerwani said.

When Biggs' body was found in the park, authorities had no leads until four months later, when a tipster said Mallard talked about the incident at a party.

The day after interviewing the tipster in February 2002, police went to Mallard's house with a search warrant.

Detective Don Owings told jurors Monday that after serving the search warrant, he saw the car in the garage with the seats missing and the windshield and rear glass broken. Officers have said they found dark stains on the passenger-side floorboard and burned car seats in her back yard.

Owings testified that 14 officers accompanied him to Mallard’s home. She was not ill-treated, he said, and she understood her rights as she was interrogated.

“She was upset. She had cried some,” he said. “But she allowed me to take the statement.”

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Online at: http://www.dallasnews.com/latestnews/stories/062303dnmettrial.1fa12.html

[Howlin]

I don't think the sex thing is true. But who knows.

[Howlin]

You have just described the prosecutor's case to a T.

[Howlin]

HA!!!

[autoresponder]

If she shot him with a stolen handgun in the Bronx (or the WH) she would walk.

Elsewhere murder averages about 6 years I believe.

Recall that guy who got 15 years for killing some dogs?

[justshe]

I think I need trials that run back-to-back until the Peterson trial. I am SUCH a court junkie! Books/real-life/exposes, etc. Shouldn't the Elizabeth Smart kidnapping trial be coming soon?

[MEG33]

Because of the nature of his injuries the medical examiner said he died in a few hours.

[Howlin]

The next trial up is the one here in Durham -- MIKE PETERSON -- the one whose wife "fell down the stairs" and died.

It was suppose to start today, but they are STILL picking a jury!

[sweetliberty]

Thanks for clearing that up.

[TomGuy]

FoxNews, especially Shep Smith, has been giving coverage throughout the day about this trial.

[A_perfect_lady]

What this report leaves out but was reported after the incident happened was that when she "talked about it" at a party, she giggled and said, "I killed a white man."

I should be surprised but I no longer am. I have long since come to terms with the fact that national news always cleans up black-on-white crime. In our culture, most people accept certain stereotypes: Blacks don't commit hate crimes, only Whites do. Blacks aren't serial killers, Whites are. There are no lurking, hostile, crazy, violent Blacks, only Whites, etc...

[Sir Gawain]

Ecstacy is bad news:

MDMA Effects
by Erowid

---

Onset	20-90 minutes
Coming Up	5-20 minutes
Plateau	2-3 hours
Coming Down	1-2 hours
After Effects	3-24 hours

Some people are considerably more sensitive to MDMA than others. Be careful if you are using MDMA for the first time or using material of an unknown purity and strength.

POSITIVE
• extreme mood lift
• increased willingness to communicate
• increase in energy (stimulation)
• ego softening
• feelings of comfort, belonging, and closeness to others
• feelings of love and empathy
• forgiveness
• increased awareness & appreciation of music
• increased awareness of senses. (eating, drinking, smell)
• profound life-changing spiritual experiences
• neurotically based fear dissolution
• sensations bright and intense
• urge to hug and kiss people
  
  NEUTRAL
• appetite loss
• visual distortion
• rapid, involuntary eye jiggling (nystagmus)
• mild visual hallucinations (uncommon)
• moderately increased heart rate and blood pressure (increases with dose)
• restlessness, nervousness, shivering
• change in body temperature regulation
• strong desire to do or want more when coming down
  
  NEGATIVE (see the MDMA Side Effects Profile)
  (negative side effects increase with higher doses and frequent use)
  
• inappropriate and/or unintended emotional bonding
• tendency to say things you might feel uncomfortable about later
• mild to extreme jaw clenching (trisma), tongue and cheek chewing, and teeth grinding (bruxia)
• difficulty concentrating & problems with activities requiring linear focus
• short-term memory scramble or loss & confusion
• muscle tension
• erectile disfunction and difficulty reaching orgasm
• increase in body temperature, hyperthermia, dehydration (drink water)
• hyponatremia (don't drink too much water)
• nausea and vomiting
• headaches, dizziness, loss of balance, and vertigo
• post-trip Crash - unpleasantly harsh comedown from the peak effect
• hangover the next day, lasting days to weeks
• mild depression and fatigue for up to a week
• severe depression and/or fatigue (uncommon)
• possible strong urge to repeat the experience, though not physically addictive
• possible psychological crisis requiring hospitalization (psychotic episodes, severe panic attacks, etc) (rare)
• possible liver toxicity (rare)
• possible neurotoxicity (controversial)
• small risk of death. Approximately 2 per 100,000 users have extreme negative reactions resulting in death. (rare)

[SauronOfMordor]

All she would have had to do was pull over, exit the car, call 911 and tell them to send ambulance, and disappear into the night. If she kept her mouth shut, nobody would have been able to prove who was driving, and the man might have lived.

[A_perfect_lady]

A jury is going to want to crucify this woman if they can.

... surely I have some nails around here somewhere.... (opening junk drawer... digging around)...

[Sir Gawain]

Now try thinking of that when you're drunk, stoned, and rolling at the same time.

[Howlin]

She drove right by a hospital. And it is more than likely that he would have lived.

[SauronOfMordor]

A jury is going to want to crucify this woman if they can.

Depends on jury pool. An OJ jury will want to get her off

[greasepaint]

Exactly what charges does Mallard face?
Murder 1, murder 2, (felony ?) hit and run?

[csvset]

POSITIVE: feelings of love and empathy

She mustn't have been feeling the full effect that night.

[TomGuy]

I should be surprised but I no longer am. I have long since come to terms with the fact that national news always cleans up black-on-white crime. In our culture, most people accept certain stereotypes: Blacks don't commit hate crimes, only Whites do. Blacks aren't serial killers, Whites are. There are no lurking, hostile, crazy, violent Blacks, only Whites, etc...

That's called the Chief Moose Crime Theory of White Guys in White Vans

[PistolPaknMama]

Because of the nature of his injuries the medical examiner said he died in a few hours. That part is simple enough to understand, however that's not what I asked about. I asked about the original statement where she said she had sex then when back out to check on the victim and he was still alive. Either the cops or media made that up, or the murderer has changed her original story. Even if he was dead the morning, he could have died "in the few hours" while she was having sex.

Nobody but a cold blooded murderer could "perform" while some guy is in your garage dying.