Posted on 10/29/2002 5:49:38 AM PST by KS Flyover
Edited on 07/12/2004 3:58:24 PM PDT by Jim Robinson. [history]
WICHITA, Kan. (AP)
(Excerpt) Read more at washtimes.com ...
For detais about the murders see: The Wichita Massacre
Wichita Massacre Trial Threads:
Wichita to revisit brutal slayings as testimony begins - 10/07/2002
Deputy recalls moment of discovering bodies [Wichita Murders] Day 1 - 10/07/2002
WICHITA MASSACRE TRIAL UNDERWAY Day 1 - 10/08/2002
Legal wrangling opens Carr trial [Wichita Murders] Day 1 - 10/08/2002
Carr trial: Survivor describes sexual attacks by armed intruders [Wichita Massacre] Day 2 - 10/09/2002
Witchita Case of Black Racist Crime Survivor's testimony horrifies courtroom Day 2 - 10/10/2002
Woman testifies that Carrs killed her friends in a soccer field [Wichita Massacre Day 3] - 10/10/2002
Prosecutors Downplay Racial Element in Kansas Murder Trial - 10/11/2002
Reginald Carr had $996, victims' credit card, watch [Wichita Massacre Day 4] - 10/11/2002
Wichita Massacre Audio of 911 Call by Female Survivor with Court Room Video Footage From Day 1- 10/11/2002
Victims' belongings linked to defendant [Wichita Massacre Day 5] - 10/12/2002
Trial opens window into night of fear - 10/13/2002
Media Ignore Kansas Interracial Mass Murder - 10/14/2002
AP Finally Reports Wichita Trial... But Mentions "White Supremacist" Support - 10/14/2002
Nosey mom tips off cops (Wichita Massacre) Day 6 - 10/15/2002
'I was afraid,' witness says [Wichita Massacre Day 6] - 10/15/2002
ATM photos shown in Carr trial [Wichita Massacre Day 7] - 10/16/2002
Testimony on cellist slaying fills Carr trial [Wichita Massacre Day 8] - 10/17/2002
Survivor says she caught STD [Wichita Massacre Day 9] - 10/18/2002
Carr trial to focus on guns and DNA [Wichita Massacre Day 10] - 10/19/2002
Luck, vivid memories helped cops [Wichita Massacre] - 10/20/2002
Wichita Massacre -- The Latest in the Black Racist Hate Crime Trial - Carrs linked to crime scene - Day 11 - 10/22/2002
Hate crime reversed - By Armstrong Williams - 10/23/2002
Evidence in Carr trial gruesome, unavoidable [Wichita Massacre Day 12] - 10/23/2002
Jurors view Wichita crime scenes / DNA ties Carrs to victims [Wichita Massacre day 13] - 10/24/2002
State to rest case against the Carrs [Wichita Massacre Day 14] - 10/25/2002
State rests; Carrs begin their side [Wichita Massacre Day 15] - 10/26/2002
DNA lets the dead speak in Carr trial [Wichita Massacre] - 10/27/2002
Carr jurors get break as deliberation rules ironed out [Wichita Massacre] - 10/28/2002
http://www.kansas.com/mld/kansas/4391807.htm
Reginald Carr won't take stand
By Ron Sylvester - The Wichita Eagle - Tue, Oct. 29, 2002Reginald Carr will not take the witness stand in his own defense. The judge in his capital murder trial ruled Monday that his testimony was inadmissible.
Sedgwick County District Judge Paul Clark said he would not allow Reginald Carr to implicate a third person in a quadruple homicide based on what Jonathan Carr, his younger brother and co-defendant, told him. It would be hearsay, which is evidence based not on a witness's personal knowledge but on something told to him by another person.
Reginald Carr's lawyer, Val Wachtel, told the judge that much of Reginald Carr's testimony would be based on a supposed phone call with his brother the morning of the killings. In his testimony, Reginald Carr would claim he wasn't present at a triplex where five people were sexually assaulted and beaten before being robbed at ATMs and shot in a nearby soccer field.
Chief Deputy District Attorney Kim Parker told Clark the law didn't allow what she termed "this SODDI defense" -- courthouse slang for "some other dude did it."
Parker argued that under the law, Reginald Carr would have to say he actually saw the unknown man shoot five people the morning of Dec 15, 2000. Some kind of direct evidence, Parker said, would be needed to contradict the state's eyewitness: a woman who survived a gunshot to the head and testified in court.
Or, as District Attorney Nola Foulston argued, Reginald Carr would have to supply the identity of the man, allowing police to find him and bring him to court.
"I don't have it," Wachtel said of the man's name. "Reginald Carr doesn't know his name. Jonathan Carr does."
Ron Evans, Jonathan Carr's lawyer, welcomed the older brother's testimony.
"I've got a few questions I'd like to ask him," Evans told the judge.
The morning of the killings, Wachtel said, Reginald Carr received a call from Jonathan Carr about a man he was with who was "trippin' " and "shooting people." To help his brother out of a jam, Reginald Carr would claim he took stolen property Jonathan Carr had to the apartment of his girlfriend, Stephanie Donley.
Police found Donley's apartment loaded with loot belonging to the four dead people and the lone survivor, including credit cards in Reginald Carr's pockets, when they arrested him that day.
Clark's ruling against the testimony is the latest in a string of setbacks for the defense.
Wachtel also told Clark on Monday that a DNA expert from Missouri had been delayed for yet another day. The jury had the day off Monday, waiting for the expert's testimony today. But she won't be coming after all.
"She fell off a roof," Wachtel told the judge.
Clark ordered the witness to fax a note from her doctor.
After brief evidence this morning, the trial will recess this afternoon, awaiting the expert, whom Clark ruled must be in court Wednesday.
Barring further delays, the jury should get the case by Thursday.
Looks like they're looking for an issue of appeal. If the jury convicts they'll ask for a new trial based on this.
Of course its total Bull S&%$. Because if someone else was there instead of Reginald Carr than how did he get a victim's DNA on his clothes? Was it from the cell phone he supposedly called them on? Oh palllease!
Compare that to that idiot judge Ito who let the defense say it was "Colombian drug lords" that must have done it, and that Mark Fuhrman (because he said the "N" word) must have framed poor OJ.
Its good to see all judges aren't so stupid.
Had to have been a factor in the Judge's ruling, since the purported hearsay evidence doesn't appear to meet any of the exceptions, including Res gestae.
Hearsay evidence CAN sometimes be admitted, but this is a desperate defense attempt to scrape together a case.
Our fellow below misses a key point of the situation - that alternate theories of the crime can certainly be put forth by the defendant. Most states require that the theory make at least some sense, and that it be supported by some admissible evidence. That's why we won't be hearing about the 'third perp'; not because the Judge ruled that the defense can't advance that argument, as suggested below, but because the hearsay evidence that the defense proposed to advance the argument is inadmissible.
republicman then uttered excitedly:
Compare that to that idiot judge Ito who let the defense say it was "Colombian drug lords" that must have done it, and that Mark Fuhrman (because he said the "N" word) must have framed poor OJ.
Its good to see all judges aren't so stupid.
Hopefully it will be a short deliberation. I think they'll take their time though to carefully look at all the evidence so that they're not accused of making a hasty decision.
Uhuh. Reread your own standards letting in nonsense about "colombian druglords" and "N words" which was all based on hearsay and not based on any evidence. Judges can also exclude things that might be prejudicial to the jury (like the "N word")
But then you probably did think Judge Ito was a great judge and handled the OJ trial well.
The more you try to make others look bad, the more you only look that way yourself.
I suppose at Bartcop they think you're a genius. But here you just look like a moron.
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