State v. Nettles

10 S.W.3d 521, 1999 Mo. App. LEXIS 1302, 1999 WL 619342
CourtMissouri Court of Appeals
DecidedAugust 17, 1999
DocketNo. 74494
StatusPublished
Cited by13 cases

This text of 10 S.W.3d 521 (State v. Nettles) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Missouri Court of Appeals primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. Nettles, 10 S.W.3d 521, 1999 Mo. App. LEXIS 1302, 1999 WL 619342 (Mo. Ct. App. 1999).

Opinion

LAWRENCE E. MOONEY, Judge.

Malik Nettles (“Defendant”) appeals the judgment entered on his conviction of murder in the first degree, Section 565.020 RSMo. (1994)1 murder in the second degree, Section 565.021; assault in the first degree, Section 565.050; and three counts of armed criminal action, Section 571.015. On appeal, Defendant argues that the trial court erred in: (1) excluding third-party confessions to these crimes; (2) overruling Defendant’s Batson challenge; (3) allowing the State to introduce evidence that Defendant had previously “shot somebody over in Pagedale”; (4) allowing the State to introduce evidence of Defendant’s nickname, “Homicide”; (5) refusing to allow Defendant to cross-examine a State’s witness concerning a forgery charge pending against her; and (6) refusing to allow Defendant to cross-examine a police officer as to the amount of money the State paid to an informant who testified against Defendant. We affirm.

FACTS

The evidence at trial, which we view in the light most favorable to the verdict, State v. Hall, 982 S.W.2d 675, 680 (Mo. banc 1998), is as follows:

At about 7:00 a.m., on February 29, 1996, a school bus driven by Richard Lane-mann (“Lanemann”) sat at the corner of Blair and Desoto waiting for a passenger to arrive. Already on the bus were fifteen-year-old Kyunia Taylor (“Taylor”), who was six months pregnant at the time, Sholanda Roberson, and Lawanda Robinson, all Beaumont High School students. While the bus sat idle, a man walked up and tapped on the door. Lanemann opened the door and the man asked, “Is this the Beaumont bus?” Wflien Lane-mann answered affirmatively, the man jumped on the bus, pulled out a pistol and shot both Lanemann and Taylor. The man got off the bus and fled the scene.

Lanemann survived the shooting. Taylor and her unborn child were not as fortunate. Taylor died almost immediately from multiple gunshot wounds to her abdomen and chest. Her baby died about a month after the shooting from extensive brain damage caused by inadequate blood supply due to her mother being shot.

Shell casings recovered at the scene of the shooting matched the bullets removed from the bodies of Taylor and Lanemann. All of the casings were from .380 caliber ammunition and were abnormally swollen, indicating that they were fired from a gun that was not designed to fire .380 caliber ammunition. Experts determined that the only gun that could have fired the .380 caliber bullets and left the shells swollen as they were was a Russian or German 9-millimeter Makarov pistol. The rifling marks on the bullet were also consistent with a 9-millimeter Makarov.

On April 11, 1996, police arrested Defendant on unrelated charges and found a 9-millimeter Makarov semi-automatic pistol in his possession. The pistol was later [524]*524conclusively determined to be the weapon used to kill Taylor and her baby and to wound Lanemann. The two other students on the bus at the time of the shooting picked Defendant out of a line-up as the gunman.

The State’s theory at trial was that a man named Mark Boyd (“Boyd”) hired Defendant to kill Taylor because Boyd did not want to take responsibility for Taylor’s pregnancy. In support of this theory, the State offered the following evidence:

In the fall of 1998, Taylor learned she was pregnant and suspected Boyd to be the father. When she and her mother confronted Boyd with the situation, he angrily denied responsibility. Taylor’s mother told Boyd that a paternity test would be conducted once the baby was born and that she would press charges if Boyd was found to be the father. DNA testing performed on Taylor’s baby after the shooting indicated that Boyd was indeed the father of Taylor’s baby.

Defendant’s friend, Ruth Ann Young (‘Young”), testified that she saw Defendant with a gun similar to a Russian Baikal 9-millimeter semi-automatic Makarov pistol on the day before the shooting. That day, Boyd met Defendant near Defendant’s home and was heard telling Defendant that he would pick him up early the next morning. Several minutes before the shooting, an eyewitness saw two men sitting in a car similar to one owned by Boyd at the corner of Blair and Desoto.

Some time prior to the shooting, Defendant’s friend, Lakisha Hopson (“Hopson”), testified that she saw Boyd give the Defendant a large sum of cash. Defendant told Hopson that the money was payment toward a debt he was owed. A couple days after the shooting, Boyd was ágain seen giving Defendant a large sum of cash.

Hopson testified that Defendant told her he had been offered money to kill Taylor, but did not indicate who had offered him the money. He also admitted to Young that he had killed “the girl on the bus.”

Based on the foregoing evidence, the jury convicted Defendant of murder in the first degree, murder in the second degree, assault in the first degree, and three counts of armed criminal action. Defendant was sentenced to life in prison without probation or parole on the first degree murder count and five life terms on the remaining counts, all terms to run consecutively. Defendant timely filed this appeal.

ANALYSIS

I. Thirdr-Party Confessions

In his first point on appeal, Defendant argues that the trial court committed reversible error in excluding extrajudicial statements of two men, Michael Durley and Lonzell Wilkes, in which Durley and Wilkes’ brother, Randy, were implicated in the shootings of Lanemann and Taylor. The Defendant’s offer of proof on this issue included out-of-court statements by numerous individuals regarding the involvement of Durley and Wilkes in this crime. Defendant primarily challenges the exclusion of a statement to the police by Lonzell Wilkes, in which he claims to have heard both Durley and Randy discussing committing the crime on the day of the shooting and a statement by Durley to the police in which he confessed to the shootings. Defendant contends that such statements constituted admissible hearsay under Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284, 300, 93 S.Ct. 1038, 35 L.Ed.2d 297 (1973), in that they exonerated him of this crime, were against the penal interest of the declarants, and were sufficiently corroborated by the evidence at trial.

Initially, we must address the State’s contention that because Defendant failed to ask the court during trial to reconsider its ruling oh the State’s motion in limine, this claim is not preserved for our review. A trial court’s grant of a motion in limine is subject to change during the course of trial and therefore preserves nothing for appellate review. State v. [525]*525Purlee, 839 S.W.2d 584, 592 (Mo. banc 1992). In order to preserve the matter for our review, the proponent of the evidence must also attempt to present the excluded evidence at trial and make an offer of proof if an objection to the proffered evidence is sustained. Id. Here, the transcript clearly shows that Defendant did present this issue at trial, and thus the issue has been preserved for our review.

The State also argues that Defendant’s claim must fail because the offer of proof submitted in connection with the motion in limine contains inadmissible evidence. We agree.

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Bluebook (online)
10 S.W.3d 521, 1999 Mo. App. LEXIS 1302, 1999 WL 619342, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-nettles-moctapp-1999.